I make Canada manly… What are you all still doing here?

So… you really want to know how I made Germany, huh?

Well, I'll tell you. It all began one dark and stormy night, when I was far less good at plastic surgery than I am now. Completely blindfolded to preserve her modesty, I had harvested some of Maria Theresa's buttcheeks from the Habsburg crypt, and along with Ferdinand's toenails and Maximillian's spleen and some other parts, I was intent on turning the corpse of the Holy Roman Empire into the Rocking Son of Prussia Meows because I thought it would be pretty fucking awesome.

I had long wanted a son of my own. Procreation is a difficult thing for nationkind. (As in, some of us, and I'm really side-eyeing France here, some of us have tried to impregnate humans. Poor girl's body melted from the inside out. And then the second girl's did. And many others. Please! Be responsible and don't buy jewelry made of obsidian. It might be the frozen lava that once composed a girl somebody tried to impregnate.

And so on the other hand, it's perfectly fine if you want to go into a haystack and undergo the process of mitosis, but human socialization, (which we really have to unlearn) taught us there's nothing stopping the rest of us nations from laughing our butts off at you and your floppy clone at the next ball or wedding or PAMNAC pool party or what have you.

So I made my own son the most natural way I possibly could. By taking a dead nation's corpse, making sure the immortal heart was still perfectly good, and then reversing the curse of livor mortis with a perfectly good pair of Hungary's queen's late buttcheeks. I animated him with lightning and poetry and my own hot Prussian blood, and seeing as he's still around to haunt me, giant, hulking muscles bubbling up out of that sad wad of child, I think I did a pretty good job of it!

Unfortunately, I never took up a real career in cosmetic procedures. Probably because humans can't survive if their hearts are torn out, and because after World War II we had to have an embarrassing little "talk" with me and the Allies confirming that I was not capable of siring any more children. By which I mean they burnt down all the creepy windmills I would have done it in.

Ah, Germany. He was so cute when he was a kid! So quiet. So serious. So full of my own fighting spirit from the moment he breathed his first. I lie awake to think about him every night. I wonder how he's doing, lonesome in suburbia. Having to cook all his meals himself, and obtain fruit gummies without my summoning skills. How one of these days Frau Froemming's bra is going to turn up back on her front steps, and that will be the day I die for real.

That was the thought that came to me tonight anyway, and I was so spooked by it I climbed out of America's fridge and went to take a cold shower. Now, stepping out of the cold shower, I wrap a towel around my waist and take in my tired reflection. My blood-shot blood-colored eyes. My drooping lips. My sopping wet white pile of feathery hair.

This is the roughed-up yet capable body of an 800-something-year-old career hooligan. I puff out my chest, and the water drips down, splattering on the floor around my toes. Geh, why do we have to be socialized like humans? I'm so romantic about looking sleepy and reserved!

"Hey, Proobs."

"CHARLES H. CHUCKET!" I screech, as the disembodied head of Canada pops up out of the toilet and stretches toward me on a too-long neck.

"Didn't expect you'd be in here at 3am," he tells me. "I was checking to see if America was awake. We had a bat problem the last time he was over at my house, and I don't want him getting an infection from shoving those foam bolts so deep in his ear canal."

I hardly hear this explanation. I'm outraged.

"Canada, don't you know that in the three years since Noodz has really done anything on this fic being a toilet ghost has become majorly cringe!? Do you have any idea what's going on on the internet right now?"

"I'm the scatman, I guess," says Canada, not quite up to speed, and then the rest of his body slowly schlorps up out of the bowl until he's standing completely dry in his hoodie and jeans in the bathroom with me. "So, what are you up to these days, my fellow esper?"

I shudder and shimmer until my own shorts and hoodie are snug on my body, and then I ceremoniously slam down the toilet lid and hoist my leg up to plant my right foot there.

"Existing," I tell him. "As long as there are eyes on me, I exist. Which begs the question, whose eyes are on those eyes, and whose were the first eyes to open?"

Canada slumps against the wall, his hands in his hoodie pockets. "Don't you ever get… creeped out by the things you've learned?"

I put my foot down and cross my arms, fighting off a yawn. "Oh, like what? The name of the universe? Frau Froemming's laundry habits? I mean… shit. I hope Blackie buried that thing deep. I'll never sleep again!"

"I won't ask," says my fellow esper. I follow him out into the kitchen. It's been a while since we've had guests. After all, cursed things happen in this kitchen. Still, I offer America's brother a forbidden cheese stick and bully Apeiron into giving me the perfect essence of a beer bottle. We munch and sip until my cringe visitor decides to elaborate.

"I've been thinking," he says, "about how these… fangirls of yours… might not have the best intentions for us."

I spit out my beer. "Was!? It must really be 3am, Canada. Why would you say a thing like that? You're supposed to be the nice twin!"

"Oh, I'm kind. And you're kind, of course, letting them perceive you here in our world. But I've been thinking… in how many worlds do they see you as a kind and sensible version of yourself?"

I flex my grimace deeper. "My fangirls love both of us, Canada. They even let you crap out my babies sometimes. There's no reason to worry!"

The aurora borealis in my cringe companion's eyes suddenly flashes dangerously. The esoteric swagger is gone, and Canada seizes me by the feathery hair.

"That is what I want to talk to you about."

"Double was!?"

America snores in the other room. With a swish of my hand, I draw the curtains closed, then free my feathers and levitate above Canada until my beady red eyes can scrutinize the anime vein pop on his forehead.

"Prussia, the universe is crumbling at the edges, and you know it. You let yourself get portrayed as a ruthless, sadistic monster. You let them write 'fanfics' about me crapping out eggs and babies and using a toilet for anything but the noble art of nocliping in and out of our current reality. Are you okay with that? Preußen? Greatest Man? Do you know what America would do to you if I told you what I'm telling you right now?"

"Ceesus, Matthias. I just finished explaining in my diary how nations don't lay eggs or crap out babies. My enlightenment is an important public service announcement."

"But why is it always me crapping out the babies!? Why not you? God, I came across a whole group of those 'fans' in the Backrooms the other night, and in the latest chapter of their brilliant novel I crapped out ten moose calves and three baby beavers to represent my provinces and territories. Why do you let them do this to us!?"

"Well, you are a pushover. That's canon, Canada."

"DUDE! IT'S NOT COOL! I DON'T HAVE ANIMALS GROWING IN MY COLON!"

"No doubt!"

Hmm… this is an angle I hadn't quite considered. Not to blame you girls, and terribly sorry you had to witness this, but like I've said before, there are little whorls in the universe where we idols are portrayed as less than ideal. It's why in our little bathole we like to say "Crossposted from FFN."

I snap my fingers, and Canada's tears evaporate.

"There, there. No use crying over spilled maple syrup, is there? You've come to the right 3am wizard. If it's creepy fangirls you're worried about, I know just the thing to deter them."

Canada melts off his stool, almost like multiple amorphous piles of sludge in the sun. His esper abilities are improving, I must admit! Still, the toilet-traveling has got to stop.

"Some kind of cosmic peppermint oil for spraying between the walls?" he asks. "A magic pair of ear plugs? Your most ineffable bottle of eye bleach?"

"Better," I tell him, flashing my most important smirk. "I'm going to make you manly."

"Wha— Dude. No. That's not the point."

"Don't you worry yourself into a tizzy, little Matthias. I will make you the buffest H*t*lia character on the block, and then no one will write a fanfiction where you're crapping out any living organisms but your own supernatural flora. Are you ready?"

"Proobs, I shouldn't have to change myself for my bullies."

"And I have not gotten to practice making abs. So hold still and loosen your stomach so it gurgles when I point at you."

"I'm going back in the toilet."

"You are not going back in the toilet. Now bulk."

I twirl my pointer finger in the general direction of Canada's gut. Immediately it gurgles, and it's enough to deter him. He buckles and moans and wraps his arms around himself, but I can feel the muscle stiffening in his grasp —his organs squeezing close behind a throbbing and burgeoning six-pack.

Fearfully, he lifts up the hoodie and t-shirt beneath. His stomach is rippling. The skin shifts like something is alive in there, and the more it bubbles and groans, the more those rigid chiseled abs push forth, clean-cut, then swelling larger, until his poor navel is stretched thin and tight. Six become eight. Eight become a bristling set of ribs.

"Well… at least they can't call me soft," he admits.

"I told you, Canada. Now lift your arms up. Pecs next. And shoulders."

"Shit. No!"

Oh yes. His chest begins to gurgle, too, and the muscle tingles and tightens. Bulges. Stretches the skin to nearly bursting as a pair of overgrown pecs tear right through the front of his hoodie. Canada's top-heavy. He stumbles to his knees, which only wobble as his left thigh shakes and expands enough to tear the seams of his jeans.

"Make it even!" he insists. "The other leg!"

"I'm trying. Stop squirming."

"Can you make it realistic at least? Just make me toned! You don't have to make me a frickin' pale grotesque!"

"Nope! Nerd To Muscle God! I saw it on a shitty YouTube animation once!"

"Why do you think I'm a nerd!?"

His right hand crackles as the bones within bristle and stretch beneath meaty new fingers and palms. He slaps himself in the face accidentally, and it cracks both the lenses in his glasses. Sweet little Matthias's pale-golden hair begins to grow. Longer and thicker it flows in shining waves down his back. A beard sprouts dark and bronze on his chin, then crops up down his neck and his knuckles and chest and back.

His voice is deeper when he speaks again. His whole body is throbbing. His back is bubbling. His feet crunch and glorp as they push out longer, tearing right through his maple-bacon socks.

"Proobs, I'm not gonna fit through the doorway if I keep growing like this. You've made your point."

"Exponential was? You're only like, eight feet tall? Nine? Sheiße, your spine…"

Is still growing. His chest is the size of a washing machine. His hands could crush my skull. His biceps pulse and strain — pulling his arms out longer than the kitchen counter. When he finally manages to stand, his head is scraping against the shitty popcorn ceiling. And still the muscles pile on — a collar of neck and a veritable shield of a stomach crawling with dark, curly, maple-syrup-colored hair. His boxer shorts have managed to hold on — though they're struggling — stretched to their limit.

The auroras flash green and purple and neon magenta in his eyes. The room grows cold. I snap my fingers, job done, a giant in America's apartment.

"There," I tell him. "You're perfectly noticeable in all the right ways. A muscle demon with buttcheeks of steel and the strength of a planet. No cringey writer would dare call you a pushover now. Any baby mooses growing in that gurgling gut of yours?"

Canada makes a few contrabass hums as he inspects his huge, hairy fingers. He flexes his pecs, then strokes his flowing mane and roars like the polar bear within.

"Honestly? I kind of love it," he laughs, showing off his moose-sized teeth. "The earth power in this body… I can feel the might of supervolcanoes beneath the Canadian Shield! I could overflow this entire continent with lava! I could wipe all of New York City off the map with a forest of maple trees! I AM THE ALL-POWERFUL CANADA!"

"Where's my danke?"

"I COULD SWALLOW AND DIGEST A GRIZZLY BEAR! I COULD PUNCH THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS INTO LITTLE PILES OF DUST! I COULD HOIST THE MIGHTY ST. LAWRENCE FROM ITS RIVER BED AND WHIP MONTREAL SO IT CRASHES RIGHT INTO TORONTO!"

"Okay, Matt. Too much testosterone."

"I AM THE GOD OF THE GREAT WHITE NORTH! I WILL EAT AAAAALLLLLL OF AMERICA'S CHEESE STICKS!" Canada announces in a voice like raging thunder.

Then he brings a bowling-ball-sized fist down upon the refrigerator, and it crumples with an incredible crash!

"Canada…"

CRACK! CRASH! CRAAAASSHHHH!

"THE CHEESE STICKS ARE MINE AT LAST!"

"Yeah… and… that's my bedroom," I whimper.

Two little smoking bullet holes appear suddenly in my own stomach. They were made by a pair of heavy-duty foam ear plugs that bounce harmlessly on the kitchen floor. I smell America's pickle breath before I even sense his nation aura. The superpower is awake. At 3am. And he is not the least bit of his usual sunshine boy self.

"Prussia Meows. What do you think you're doing to my brother?"

I bloat into the seventh dimension, and I'm gone.

~N~

Published by scrivenernoodz on FFN August 27th, 2024. Don't repost. Please review!