"I hate you."

That was the first thing Natalya had said in about five hours. She was royally pissed.

"I know," Alfred responded. "But..."

"Nyet, don't you dare try to justify that. You nearly got us killed!" She interrupted.

Alfred pouted and glared at the road ahead of him. "Ok first of all, I would never let that happen. Second, you would've been fine anyway. And third... I don't care what you say that was epic."

"Right, nearly getting swept up by an F5 tornado is epic," she huffed sarcastically.

"Yes," he beamed. She facepalmed and pulled down her eyelids while dragging her hand down her face. "How. How is this fool my friend?" She asked herself under her breath.

"I know it's quite dreadful isn't it?" He quipped with a smirk. Holy shit he was ticking her off. "What the hell is wrong with you?! Ever since that tornado you've been acting like a cocky bastard."

"Sorry, it's just way too much fun riling you up."

"Seriously? So you're just acting obnoxious all the time for kicks?" She asked, already beginning to reconstruct her beliefs on all the dumb stuff he's done and said over the years.

"Uhh, I don't know anything about that. I meant you specifically," he admitted. "Honestly it just feels good to have someone to knock heads with again. I haven't had a real challenge since your brother."

"Isn't he still your rival?" She asked. Alfred shrugged. "Well yeah, but we're not really at each other's throats anymore. Which is good since there's no threat of nuclear war, but bad since now I'm kinda just left alone."

"What about the geezer? He's starting to grow more powerful, and he already hates you because of your debt," she suggested.

"China? Maybe in a decade or two, but right now he's kind of... meh," he shrugged again.

Natalya looked at him in bewilderment. "Then how am I a challenge? His country is way stronger than mine. 'Even though he's a pussy.'

"Because he's old as dirt and really, really boring," he argued. "I don't know if you've ever paid attention during one of his presentations, but they are some of the most painful lectures I've ever sat through."

"If he can irritate you that easily then maybe he is a good pick as a rival. As much as I hate to admit it he's really similar to how the USSR was: communism, dictators, hating you. Hell, he's even gone further and began committing genocide-"

Natalya was interrupted by the sound of something bending and cracking, bringing her gaze over to Alfred's hands which were gripping so hard to the steering wheel that everything up to his wrists had turned white from the pressure.

He turned slightly to her and gave her a large, childish grin, but his eyes were so cold and dreary, it rivaled even the likes of Sweden. "You made your point," he stated, no ounce of emotion in his words.

"..."

"...Anyway! The point I was trying to make is that you're actually interesting. You're young, feisty, and don't take shit from anyone. Not to mention you're super mysterious. I only know the basics of your history so there could be all sorts of little tricks and powers you've got that I don't know about."

Natalya nearly got whiplash just from his switch of tone. Seriously, she should be used to that by now. "So... what, you just want me around for some stupid faux Cold War because you're bored without my brother?"

"I mean... a little bit," he confessed. Natalya glared darkly at him, so he quickly corrected himself. "B-But I swear it's mostly just friends for the sake of being friends."

She rolled her eyes and looked away from him. "You truly are one bizarre nation, Alfred."

"Thank you."

"That... that wasn't a compliment," she sighed while rubbing her forehead.

One more night and sixteen hours later they had made it to their destination, the middle of the woods.

Earlier in their drive Natalya had seen a bunch of mountains, but at some point he began driving close to some and now they appeared to be in the middle of nowhere.

The good news in this situation was that he told her she didn't need to wear jeans, in fact she should probably layer up. That instantly flipped her mood from apprehensive to eagerly excited.

So after Alfred hoisted up a large backpack onto his back, the two began following a narrow dirt trail into the forest. It just seemed like any regular forest, but as they walked further into it Natalya began to notice that they were walking up.

Every time they would walk to the top of one hill, they would find another one right behind it, even larger and steeper than before. This pattern seemed to go on forever, enough to the point where Natalya had already grown bored in a mere twenty minutes. Oh if only she knew how long this hike was.

"Uggggh, how much longer?" She groaned. Alfred turned his head and looked back at her. "You're seriously over this already?"

"..."

"That wasn't a rhetorical question, we're not even close to the destination," he answered, much to her displeasure.

"Where are we even going anyway?" She asked, praying it was something entertaining. Alfred bit the inside of his cheek in slight annoyance. "I already told you I wasn't gonna spoil any surprises."

The two walked a little further, until Natalya spoke up again. "Why did you tell me to wear heavy clothes? It's hot as shit out. Are you even sure we're at the right place?"

"You know, your constant questioning is seriously beginning to bum me out," he told her with a side glance.

Her eye twitched slightly as she glared back at him. "Oh, well I'm sorry. Guess I'm a fool for wanting to know where we are. How moronic of me."

"I never said that," he defended. Natalya didn't listen and held her head high as she sped up to move in front of him. "Nyet, nyet, you're right. It was my fault for asking, I should've known better."

"Cut that out, I didn't call you stupid!" He yelled as he stopped walking. Natalya also stopped walking and looked back at him, crossing her arms and giving an audible "hmph!" before turning around and walking back up the hill.

"Seriously?!" He whined as he held his arms out. "You're seriously pissed because I want to keep things interesting?"

Despite his calls she kept walking, until he was barely able to see her through the dense foliage.

'I can't believe her! You know, maybe you're right about her being psycho, only a psycho would be angry about surprise vacations.'

'Actually, I think she's startin' ta grow on me.'

'Really? How'd you manage that? Aren't you the one trying to get rid of her in the first place?'

'That was before seeing how easily she can anger ya.'

'Of course,' Alfred sulked as he began marching after her. In no time he caught up to and even passed her, leading her in the right way since she strayed off the path.

"We're going up a mountain," he hissed.

"Huh?" She questioned.

"Did I stutter? We're going up a fucking mountain!" He yelled as he stopped and turned around to give her a dirty look.

She glared back just as hard, until Alfred broke the eye contact to turn back around and begin stomping away.

The two continued down the path, equally and absolutely livid. Natalya death stared the back of his head, wishing she could wrap her arms around it and snap it clean off.

Almost as if on instinct, her arm lowered to her garter and gripped a knife handle, slowly pulling it out and raising it above her head before chucking it at the back of his head.

Without even looking, he raised his hand and caught the knife between two of his fingers. As he brought it in front of him to inspect it, he snapped his head around and snarled at her. "Oh that's real mature!"

Natalya put her hands on her hips and bent forward to close the distance between them. "You're one to complain, at least I'm not throwing a temper tantrum like a baby because I didn't care about your ridiculous surprise!"

"I'm just trying to make this vacation more fun, you're the one complaining. Not even half an hour in you're whining about "hOw MuCh LoNgEr?" and "WhErE aRe We?" Why can't you just chill out and wait to discover where we are going?"

"Because I don't like surprises. Just give it to me straight, I don't care for your secrecy. It doesn't make it fun, in fact it makes the trip worse because I have nothing to look forward to."

Alfred's hand balled into a fist. No way she just insulted his epic vacation. "I think I'm beginning to see why you hate your birthday so much," he jeered.

Natalya gasped and slapped him across the face. "You know why you asshole!"

Alfred moved a hand up to his face and rubbed it. "Yeah I do. I also know that you're here because of the same person, so unless you want to get sent back home you better stop hating on my vacation every two goddamn seconds."

"..."

"Oh and one more thing, how about being a little grateful for the thousands of dollars I've spent on you this past month! I may be the richest country but that shit's still expensive."

Natalya's face darkened as she stepped forward and stared up at him. "Don't you fucking start! Besides the phone, I didn't ask you for a goddamn thing. You either offered it or bought it on your own."

"Yeah? Well it still couldn't hurt to show some damn gratitude! If it weren't for me you would still be wandering around Boston and crying in alleys," he yelled as he lowered down to butt heads with her.

Natalya pointed a finger at his face and screamed, "fuck you America!!"

His jaw dropped as he stepped back, giving her room to step past him and walk away. His jaw slowly closed, then clenched hard as his whole body tensed.

A pulse of pure rage coursed through his whole body, before erupting as he turned to the nearest tree and punched it as hard as possible, sending his arm clean through it.

He kept his arm in the tree for a good few minutes until his anger subsided. As he pulled it back out, the tree snapped and fell to the ground with a loud thud.

Natalya was long gone at this point, leaving him all alone in the middle of the forest. 'Fucking stupid!'

With his head hung low and hands tucked in his pockets, he continued along the trail. The rest of this trip was going to be a lot less fun now.

About fifteen minutes later, he finally caught sight of Natalya far in the distance. She was still on the path toward the mountain surprisingly.

Alfred sped up a little bit so they were shoulder to shoulder. "The RV is the other way," he told her. She turned and angrily gazed at him. "I know. Just because you're being a dick doesn't mean I'm not going to climb the mountain. I'm just going to do it without you."

He let out a scoff and began walking past her. "You better hurry up then, it takes around eight hours to reach the summit."

Natalya momentarily froze in place, looking over at Alfred who was giving her a cocky grin. "Oh that's right, you don't have any mountains in your country, do you?"

He laughed and turned away from her, angering her greatly. Why was he being such an ass? Was he seriously that upset about his stupid surprise being ruined?

Before she could think of any insult to comeback at him with, he had already sped away. That guy was a whole mess of emotions, one minute he's brushing off insults like they were nothing, the next he's screaming at her over trivial bullshit.

There was a very fine line she had to read, otherwise it was nearly impossible to understand what he was thinking. And right now she was reading that he really didn't like his plans being called stupid.

But that didn't excuse him being so mean. She was asking valid questions, having them be answered shouldn't be a point of argumentation.

While she was cursing and continuing their argument in her head, Alfred had managed to speed walk half a mile ahead of her.

'I don't get her, she goes from actually excited to bored and angry just like that,' he fumed, snapping his fingers to emphasize his point.

'She's not dat bad.'

'I still can't believe you've become the one defending her.'

'I know. Who woulda thought?'

'Why aren't you mad? She's completely ruining the trip!'

'Because unlike ya I'm actually thinkin' logically, yer gettin' too emotional over nothin'. All she wanted ta know was where she was, was dat so hard ta answer?'

'I don't know, is it so hard for her to let me surprise her?'

'When she don't want ta be surprised den yes.'

'...'

'Look Union, maybe ya should just apologize ta her.'

Alfred tucked his hands deeper into his pockets and slouched forward. 'I have nothing to apologize for.'

'I swear, dat pesky stubbornness of yers is da only reason ya beat me.'

'There were many reasons I won, but sure.'

'...Do ya really want ta start a fight with me too?'

Alfred sighed and stared at his feet, watching each one as they moved back and forth. It was the only real entertainment he had. It was either this or talk to Confederacy.

He kept his eyes glued to the ground for a very long time. He had no clue how long, but once he began to see bright gray rock rather than dirt and green plants he got a pretty good estimate that it had been a few hours.

Finally he moved his gaze up from the ground, looking over at Longs Peak in the distance. He sighed and looked back at the ground as he made his way to the front of it.

'How the heck did I lose him?' Natalya thought as she exited the forest, looking around at the plain gray landscape.

In the distance she could see the mountain, and a long trail to her right trailing toward the side of it. She took the trail, assuming it would loop around to a more gentle incline.

A couple hours later, she was now on a small hill to the right of the base of the mountain, where she found Alfred standing under it and digging in his backpack for something.

"What are you doing?" She called out to him. He turned around and showed her an armful of random objects, before turning back around and beginning to arrange them in the backpack.

After zipping it up, he lifted the backpack with one arm, backed away from the bottom of the mountain, then wound back before throwing it straight in the air. Natalya watched as it flew up and landed on the peak of the mountain.

He walked back over to the base and grabbed onto some rocks on the cliff face, then hoisted himself off the ground as he slowly began climbing up.

"Why are you doing that? There's a path right here," she said as she pointed at the trail she was walking on.

"Well yeah, you can go that way if you're a loser," he shrugged. "This way is much faster and more dangerous though."

"What did you just call me?!" She shrieked. Alfred rolled his eyes and sighed. "I believe I called you a loser. Or is a wuss a better term?"

Even with about fifty feet in between them, he could still feel the dark aura burning like a fire around her.

She suddenly began running down the hill and hopping over boulders as she ran over to where he was. They started climbing as well, going at a faster rate so they could catch up to Alfred.

"Oh, so you're not a wuss. I figured such a flat country as you would be afraid of heights," he joked with a smug grin. Natalya didn't even glance at him as she began climbing ahead of him. "I'm not afraid of anything."

"Except for surprises I guess," he mumbled. Suddenly a knife whizzed past his face and stuck in the rock next to him.

He followed the knife back to Natalya, who was flipping him off. Alfred glared as he took the knife and put it in his pocket, then flipped her off as well.

She scoffed and began climbing again, going much faster than him. Alfred raised an eyebrow and began speeding up too. "Are you trying to race me?"

Natalya didn't say a word and continued climbing. Alfred frowned and followed after her. "Fine, if you want a race then that's what you'll get!"

The two began racing, throwing insults and sometimes knives on Natalya's end.

"For fuck's sake, stop with that!" Alfred yelled as he caught another knife.

"Suck a cock!" She yelled back, echoing throughout the entire area. Hopefully there wasn't a family hiking nearby.

"I would rather do that then deal with you for another minute!" He roared while throwing a rock at her.

She moved her head out of the way and growled. "Then leave! The way back is right down there!" She pointed at the ground, which was a good 100 feet below them now.

Alfred laughed and shook his head. "Screw that!" Natalya smirked as she began climbing sideways toward him. "Here, I'll help you!"

She then began kicking at his legs, nearly making him lose his grip. "Hey, fuck off!" He yelled as he began kicking back. He eventually resorted to climbing away and kicking at her whenever she tried to grab him.

She chase-climbed after him for a good ways up the cliff, until both began getting tired around the 400 ft mark.

"I should've just taken the damn trail!" She complained as she stopped to rest. Alfred looked down at her from about twenty feet above her. "It's better this way, we're already almost halfway up. If you took the trail then you would be going for miles."

"Oh yeah? And how tall is this cliff?" She asked as she wedged her arms in a crack to hold herself in place.

"Uhhh, about 900 feet?" He guesstimated. Natalya groaned and set her head against the rock.

Alfred mockingly groaned the same way, making her look up and frown at him. "Don't be such a crybaby," he insulted as he began climbing again.

Natalya grabbed a rock and broke it off the cliff before throwing it at the back of Alfred's head. He ducked just in time for the rock to fly right above his head. He just sighed and continued climbing.

After her short rest she followed as well, and once again caught up to him. For the next 200 feet they didn't say a word to each other, beginning to bring them hope that their argument was finally over. That was until Natalya mumbled, "you're the crybaby."

Alfred turned to her and began screaming, so she turned toward him and began screaming, and now they were both screaming and pointing accusingly at each other.

As they simultaneously climbed up and continued arguing, they started to subconsciously begin moving toward each other. Until the point where they were right in each other's faces and yelling on the top of their lungs.

They were both red in the face and a second away from fighting. If only Natalya hadn't thrown all her knives at him already.

With no other way of getting her frustration out, she slammed the side of her hand into the cliff, making a big crack in the rocks. That struck both of them silent, so now they were just angrily huffing at each other.

Suddenly the sound of more cracking snapped both of them out of their anger, bringing both of their attention to the rocks as they watched a large crack begin circling around where Natalya was holding.

Then without warning the whole slab of rock snapped off, sending her falling back down the cliff. Alfred reached out and grabbed her tightly by her right forearm, preventing her fall but unintentionally putting her in the way of the descending slab.

It connected hard against her shoulder joint, resulting in a sickening pop that made her grit her teeth and grip hard to Alfred's arm.

All anger vanished as Alfred looked at her pained face. "Nat, are you alright?!"

She growled and opened her eyes to glare at him. "I told you not to call me that. . . but yes I'm alright. Though I think my shoulder's dislocated."

Alfred laughed and smirked down at her. "Doesn't feel too good does it?" She moved her attention from the cloud of dust the slab created, far down on the ground, up to his smiling face. "Alfred this is serious! I can't move it."

Alfred's smile dropped as his expression changed to one of determination. He yanked her up so she was at his level, and as she was in the air he wrapped the arm around her waist and held her to him.

"Can you grab that rock with your other arm?" He asked. Natalya nodded and reached up and grabbed the rock, allowing Alfred to momentarily let go of her and leave her dangling.

He then reached over to a rock on the other side of her and slowly began climbing around, getting her a little embarrassed about being pushed up against the wall.

Now on the other side, he felt around her shoulder for a minute to inspect the damage. "Luckily it seemed to pop back in place, and since it wasn't nation-caused it should heal in a couple hours."

"Thank you for the diagnosis doctor, but I'm kind of hanging on for life here," she reminded him.

Alfred's eyes widened before nodding. "Right. Alright, this is gonna hurt but I need to lift your arm, ok?"

Natalya rolled her eyes. "Sure, fuck it. Just do it." Alfred grabbed her by her arm and slung it over his neck, making her wince a little. Then using his own free arm he wrapped it around her waist.

"Ok, so try reaching out to that rock there," he instructed while pointing at it with his gaze. She followed and let go of the rock she was holding, but since Alfred was holding her waist she was able to grab the other rock without falling.

Alfred grinned and began looking above him for a rock to grab onto. Seeing a good one, he made sure there was a good foothold he could land on before jumping up and pulling up to be at the same height as Natalya.

"Sweet, now that one."

The process repeated itself for quite awhile: Alfred would point out a rock, Natalya would either grab or step on it, Alfred would jump to his own rock, then would give her some words of encouragement. Such as "awesome job" or "good going!"

"Come on, just another 100 or so feet to go!" He cheered as they slowly moved up the cliff.

Natalya growled in annoyance. "Ok that's enough, you've been giving out empty compliments ad nauseam. It's not like I'm just going to give up randomly."

"I'm not sure what that word meant, but ok," he said as the two continued.

"I'm almost certain you do," she whispered under her breath. "You say something?" He asked.

"It's nothing, now stop talking and climb faster," she demanded. Alfred agreed and the two picked up the pace.

Around ten minutes later a hand slapped the top of the peak, before hoisting both people onto the flattish rock. Both were heaving and rolled onto their backs, the tops of their heads almost touching as they laid opposite of each other.

Suddenly Alfred let out a wheezing chuckle as he pointed out at the horizon. "Yo... Nat, che-check out t-that sunset!" Natalya lazily turned and looked out at the horizon as well, seeing the bright orange orb as it peeked above the pointy mountains. It was overwhelmingly beautiful. Dammit why did his country have to be beautiful?!

"I thou—thought I t-told you not to-to call... dammit why am I so short of breath?! I'm not even that tired!" She questioned before taking a huge inhale of air to replace the one she screamed out.

"It's the altitude, there's less air," he answered as his breath slowly began to return. Natalya tipped her head back to look at him. "Oh yeah, guess I've never been this high before."

"Yeah, it takes some getting used to," he admitted. "I think I'm just going to lay here for a little before getting any dinner or anything."

"Ok," she agreed.

"..."

"..."

"..."

"Could I have my knives back now?" She asked. Alfred dug into his pockets and pulled out multiple knives before setting them on the ground next to Natalya's head.

"I'm surprised you kept all of them," she said while slowly sorting them back onto her garter.

"What was I supposed to do, leave them?" He asked. Natalya shrugged. "Well yeah, any normal person getting knives thrown at them wouldn't want anything to do with them."

"Huh, guess I'm just weird then," he joked as he sat up. He fully stood up and looked down at her. "Come on, let's get away from the edge."

Natalya got up and walked further onto the peak, Alfred following after grabbing the nearby backpack he tossed up earlier.

After setting up a tent and getting out some food, the two sat across from each other and ate in silence. Alfred unsurprisingly finished first so he spent a good chunk of time watching her eat.

He scratched his head in thought as he tried to formulate an apology. The only reason it was difficult was because he still partly believed he didn't do anything wrong. Damn stubbornness.

A cold shiver suddenly traveled across his entire body, making him tuck into himself. "I forgot how cold it gets up here."

Natalya on the other hand was completely unfazed, she was just eating food like there wasn't a frigid breeze blowing onto her back.

Alfred looked at her jealously, until a grin spread across his face. "Yeah, I'm not too good with cold places," he began as he laid down.

"The deserts and plains are more my kind of style... I can't wait to get to the Grand Canyon," he trailed off as he glanced over at her. She raised her eyebrows and glanced back at him from her food.

He smirked a little and continued. "Then of course there is Monument Valley, that place is the most deserty desert I can think of."

Natalya slowly set her plate of food on her lap to listen. "Though those little towns all built in those dried up lakes of Nevada do remind me of the old mining towns. Man I miss being a cowboy."

He glanced back up at her, seeing her watching him intently. He turned to her fully and gave her a huge smile. "Don't worry about the heat, I know how much you hate that. The first few stops may be scorching but I hear Yellowstone is pretty mild this time of year."

As he finished he gave another warm grin, seeing the very smallest hint of a smile from her.

"Right, well I should probably turn in for today," he said as he got under the covers of his sleeping bag. Natalya agreed as she finished her food, zipped the door flap closed, then got under her own sleeping bag.

Due to the low oxygen and their exhaustion from hiking and climbing all day, they both quickly drifted off to sleep.

Natalya rose up and looked around at her surroundings, she was back at the base of the mountain she just climbed. Though it was much shorter, only about twice her height. Everything besides the mountain was complete darkness, so naturally she began climbing it. As she reached the summit, she suddenly came face to face with the front of big, brown leather boots. Raising her head to find the owner, she gasped as she looked straight at the face of Russia, who was giving her a disapproving look with his signature pipe resting on his shoulder.

She tried to call out to him, but nothing came out, simply a strained and broken whisper. Russia shook his head and brought the pipe down on her hand, making her lose her grip and fall on her butt. The mountain then began growing, becoming monstrously large to the point where she couldn't see Russia anymore. Natalya instantly began climbing it again, she refused to lose him again. However, every time she tried going up, the mountain grew slightly taller.

Using all her strength and desperation, she struggled her way to the top, finding Russia again but now he was accompanied by Ukraine and the Baltics, who were all looking away from her. The only one who wasn't was Lithuania, who was smiling creepily and handing her love letters. She screamed a silent scream and backed away from him, only for him to begin following her. So she grabbed him by the shirt and threw him off the mountain, but as she looked up he was there again, now with a severed copy of her head in a birthday present.

She decided to just ignore him for now, it's not like he could truly harm her in anyway. Bringing her attention to the others, they were all still facing away. Passing Estonia and Latvia, she grabbed Ukraine by the shoulder and spun her around, jumping back when she noticed that her sister had no face, yet tears were still managing to pour out of nowhere. The last person was Russia again, who was gripping his pipe hard in one hand with his head hung low.

She grabbed him by the arm and turned him around, seeing that he did have a face, but he was crying as well with the same bruise on his face that he had given her days prior. Glancing past her for a second, he closed his eyes and looked away while biting his lip. Natalya tried reaching out for him, but suddenly felt a force pull her back. Looking behind her, she found China with an unnaturally curved grin and wild eyes, then without warning he threw her off the edge of the mountain.

Flailing around in the air, she managed to catch onto the cliff face again, at the cost of injuring her left arm. And so she climbed for a third time, slipping every once in a while due to her limited grip. After an eternity of climbing, and having to restart a few times, she was nearing the peak once again. Just as she was about to grab the top, something grabbed her leg and pulled her down. Latching onto the nearest rock, she was stuck dangling with a massive weight on her leg.

She looked down at her foot, finding a demonic-looking China coiling a gross tentacle arm up her leg and the beginning of her waist. Looking back at the peak... just a foot away yet impossible to reach... she began to cry. Russia was so close, so so close, and all she could do was dangle here and wait to lose her grip. She silently bawled her eyes out while attempting her final, pitiful attempt to get up.

Slowly her fingers began to slip off, first her pinky, then her ring, with the other two only seconds behind. She closed her eyes and let a final stream of tears fall as she felt the rock leave her grip and the rush of air begin to hit her from the bottom. But suddenly it all stopped, shocking her eyes open as she shot her head up, finding familiar bright blue eyes and a bobbing curl.

Alfred was grinning down at her with his classic one million megawatt smile and kind eyes. Then with complete ease, he pulled her up to the top of the mountain and into a tight hug. It was long and warm, and seemed to heal her arm wound and dry her tears.

Pulling back away from him, she found that he was the only one on the mountain. Even as she turned away from him to check if China was still there, his big smile and patience for her attention never wavered. Turning back to him, she gave him a tiny smile, which made him close his eyes and give an even bigger smile.

But that elated smile suddenly morphed into a dark glare as he stared at her, or rather something behind her. Confused, she began turning around, but suddenly found Alfred grabbing her and spinning her around to be on the other side of him. His hands suddenly disappeared from her, making her turn around to find where he went.

Her eyes widened in shock as she found Alfred in a full nelson, struggling greatly against the demon China who had come out of nowhere. Then also out of nowhere, Russia appeared and walked past her to stand in front of Alfred. Passing one teary-eyed glance to her, he looked back to Alfred and raised his pipe above his head.

Natalya understood what was about to happen and shouted for him to stop, but of course no noise came out. Tears began reforming in her eyes as she couldn't physically stop him either, it was like an actual wall was holding a pipe. She stepped back and looked between her brother and Alfred, freezing on the American's serious expression as he mouthed the word, "run!" Then Russia cocked back and swung the pipe down.

Natalya shot up and loudly gasped, a cold sweat all over her body. She looked around the room in utter confusion, seeing she was in a small tent all alone. It was all just a dream... it was just a dream.

Slowly climbing out of the sleeping bag, she peeked her head out of the front of the tent and found Alfred with his hands on his hips and facing toward the sunrise.

He must have heard her gasp, because he turned around and raised an eyebrow. "You all good?" Natalya nodded and fully exited the tent.

"That's good. . . do you think you can take a picture of me in front of the sunrise? I look like a total hero right now," he said pridefully while getting back in his hero pose.

Natalya didn't argue this time and took out her phone, taking a picture then putting it back in her pocket. Alfred turned around and smiled at her, unsettlingly similar to her dream. "So, you ready to go back down?"

Natalya nodded and walked over to him, following him as he went around and collected everything. Now with his backpack repacked, the two walked back over to the cliff they climbed up from.

"Don't tell me we're climbing back down," she groaned. Alfred laughed and shook his head. "Nah I'm just enjoying the view for a sec. We're gonna get down through the Keyhole Route," he said as he turned and gave her a smug grin. "You know, the loser path."

Natalya glared at him and in one swift motion sent him off the cliff. He gasped and looked at her in surprise, before falling down to the ground screaming, "you biiiiiiiitch!!"

She smirked down at the large dust cloud that formed, before turning to go down the correct path.

About eight hours later, she came down to the bottom of the mountain, finding Alfred angrily sitting on the ground with torn and blood-soaked clothes. Noticing her, he got up and began walking alongside her silently.

"That was not cool dudette," he muttered. Natalya smiled a little bit, and didn't push it back down this time.

"That did get me thinking though... do you want to go skydiving?" He asked. Natalya shook her head. "Nyet, I don't."

He chewed the inside of his cheek and shrugged. "Worth a try I guess."