Now I smell like troll… Am I in a children's book?
PRUSSIA'S GRAND TOUR OF THE UNIVERSE, DAY 3!
The dream projection woman squeezes my arm and nuzzles her face all over my sopping wet jacket like a cat.
"Prussia, will you go on a date with me? I know a good sushi joint."
"Good God, Suzy. You know I have to control myself around mackerel."
Before she can protest, my train arrives, and I'm scrambling off the platform into the car. I'll always respect a hug request! Hugs are the stuff of happiness. But some of my fans are starting to want dates, too, and I'm a little tied-up right now with my travels. Another dream! I have to tell them. Maybe some other night, when you've gone to bed at a decent time and you're not scrolling through your Google docs rereading the deviantart-level trash you wrote about Austria yesterday. (Keep writing that. It's pure gold.)
The train takes me nowhere. It's filled with dream projections, and many of them are speaking Chinese. Must be nighttime for China in whatever real world is touching the Anticanon. A few more projections pop into existence on the train as their real-world bodies enter REM sleep. Wait… is that… that's Old Man China!
"Ugh, why are you here, Prussia?"
"Oh, you know. Exploring the universe to find the secret of your youthful looks."
"Don't try to flatter me. You know it's antimatter keeping me youthful. You're using it, too."
"But you don't have an antimatter lab. And for your information, using volatile particles for a facelift is not only primitive, but asinine. Cool people like me just bathe in the sun's core for an hour, then eat a shit-ton of bananas to cancel out the radiation."
He stares at me, not knowing what to think of this suggestion. (It's a great one.) Then his dream shifts into a field of sheep, and he's gone from sight.
I really like bananas.
The train shoots forward, and suddenly I'm looking out the windows to see a thick forest all around. Toads are leaping. Mushrooms are sprouting. Weird bugs are glowing rainbow colors. I think I even see a fanged turtle in the mix!
Epic! A fantasy world! I hope it has dragons to dry out my clothes! I'd rather not turn into my own blow-drier. Makes my hair too poofy.
I square my shoulders, puff out my chest, and rip the wall of the train open, revealing the world outside. Like a stone sinking in water, I phase past the membrane of the dream world and fall into the forest. No train. No passengers. Just dirt up my nose and the familiar smell of—
Shit, this isn't a fantasy world. That's the Rhine I smell. The boring, boring Rhine that Germany just loves to bits because Berlin is too old and stuffy for cool kids like him. I crawl forward over roots and shimmy through bushes until I come to the edge of a cliff. Yep. I'm on the western promontory. Some hundred feet below is the Rhine rushing northward. Not a wildly different world, but I suppose there's something interesting about it. The Rhine looks shinier than it does at home, and I've never seen these rainbow bugs before. Ach, they're stinging me!
"Hey, do you need some help? Are you stuck?"
It sounds like a little kid asking. I wriggle back out of my current bush and stand up, brushing off my shirt. What should I ask? What year is it? Am I in Germany? Who's the chancellor? Are there pop-tarts that don't crumble to bits in the toaster?
But I can't ask any questions. When I see the kid who found me, I can only squeak out a few wimpy syllables.
"Ger…. muh-nee?"
Little Germany stares up at me with those big blue eyes I would die for over and over and over again. His hair is that perfect little mushroom bowl cut. His face is round and soft and without all the angry tick marks and half-shaved sideburns, and he's only looking with curiosity, not suspicion. So cute! It's like for once, I can look at Germany, and he's not going to ask for the thousandth time why the creator of Wow! Wow! Wubbzy! is the Messiah.
"Who are you?" He asks, and I'm foaming at the mouth from sheer adorability. I wipe my lips with a swing of my wrist, and now I'm ready to give in to urges. In seconds, I'm hugging the kid as tight as I can. Oh, he smells just like I remember! Detergent and mint!
"Aw, you're so cute! My world has nothing this cute anymore!"
"Your world? You're from another world?"
"Yeah! A completely different world!"
"Are there wizards there?"
"Wizards?"
I take my arms away, and that's when I see what the kid is wearing. Over his little suspenders and farmer pants, he's got on a black robe. The pockets are stuffed with mushrooms and leaves.
"Thank you for not smothering me," he says. "You should know it's rude to hug someone without asking first. What if I was dangerous?"
"You don't look dangerous," I tell him.
"I'm not. But I could be. My name is Ludwig, and I'm going to be a wizard when I grow up. What's your name?"
"It's Gilbert."
The kid's face lights up. Does he know a Gilbert, too? Do I exist in this world? Better to keep a low profile after what happened with the octos. I must look different enough from this world's Prussia for the kid not to recognize me. It makes me curious, but I go with it, following him deeper into the forest.
"So what's a kid like you doing all the way up here in the woods?"
"Oh, I know these woods. I live here," he says, lifting his chin. "Ach. I made my brother mad, and now I have to collect troll dandruff for his potions."
"Is there something wrong with that?"
"Just that the trolls and I aren't on good terms after I lied to one last week. Trolls don't like lies."
"Ha! Well, I doubt any creature could stay mad at a cutie."
"My brother says I'm not supposed to talk to strangers, especially if they're calling me cute. They could be changelings trying to steal me away and wear my shape to steal my food."
"I'm not a changeling. I'm a wizard like you."
"Really!?" He swings around wildly, giving me the same look he gave me whenever I brought him a present after battle.
"Really," I say, and to prove it, I snap my fingers, and my jacket shimmers and morphs into a purple cloak.
"Wow! Without even a wand! You must be very powerful! Teach me some spells please! Please!? I never get to do any magic with my brother. He says his dark magic is too dangerous. He just makes me collect ingredients, and sometimes he lets me stir potions."
THIS CHILD. He's so sweet I can feel my fat cells rapidly dividing. I hate to let him down. But the combined transmutation and transformation of textiles in one snap is not easy to teach.
"Wizards must make their own discoveries. Plus, if you wanted to be my apprentice, you'd have to go through the ritual, which we don't have time for. Why don't you show me this troll instead?"
Ach! The pouty face! The one that speaks of stories cut short and cakes all eaten by that gluttonous ostrich of a cousin! I have to shield my eyes to save myself from the mighty force. But Ludwig's never been a whiner. He accepts what he can and figures out how to wiggle out of it later. This world's Lud is no different. He spins around and keeps going.
He asks me various questions about my magic practice. What my world is like. How I got here. What my thoughts are on changeling civil rights. "I assume you treat people nicely despite their differences," I tell him. "But I've never met a changeling before. Is that bad?"
He only smirks. "You probably have met one. They're skilled shapeshifters."
"Unlike me," I grumble to myself. Just the other night I tried changing into a wolf, and Germany spent until 3 in the morning bringing ice for my overgrown furry feet. My essence isn't limited to this body, and yet trying to alter it in any way is a way bigger pain than you'd think.
We emerge in a pine grove crawling with thousands of spiders. I cringe, but Little Lud walks right in and heads over to a blueberry bush. He shakes it a few times, and the strangest little creature falls out of the brambles. Squat. Fat. Big nose and bigger ears. And if this weren't children's bookish enough, he's got on a little waistcoat and nothing around his loins.
"Ludwig! Swap-child of Piyo Tower! You have returned to apologize, of course."
Ludwig squares his shoulders and nods. "Yes, Herr Wecken. I'm very sorry I lied to you. Will you give me some dandruff for my brother's potions?"
The troll literally swells with annoyance, his head going from Ludwig's ankles to his waist in a matter of seconds. "Such lack of tact! I will not give you anything, of course! I do not owe you anything, of course! I am not a creature to be harvested, of course!"
I start thinking maybe this is unfair and Lud shouldn't ask a stranger for his dandruff, but then I realize this is the creature crawling in my Germany's ears at night and making him say Brötchen, so all sympathy is lost.
"Come on, the kid's on a mission. He needs dandruff for… what kind of potion is it?"
"A love potion I think? Or a chicken transformation potion."
"That gives us a very wide range of possibilities."
"I know. I should be paying attention more, but his hand-wringing is so annoying I end up going to bed before I learn anything about potions. One time he even invited me downstairs for some late-night brewing and tricked me into making him soup."
"Magic soup?"
"Just soup."
"I wouldn't put it past him."
"Enough of this!" Wecken the Troll squeals. "My parts are not your ingredients, of course! You will leave, of course! Ludwig, and… ah! The Great Prussia of Infinite Dimensions!"
"Not infinite. Ceesus Chips, why can't anyone handle finite existence? The universe isn't that big."
"It's not?" Ludwig asks. "Okay, if you're from another world, do the stars talk? My brother says he can hear them talking, but I can't."
"Of course the stars talk. Haven't you ever heard of radio waves?"
"Radio…"
The troll decides now is a good time to grow and swell 'til he's the same height as me. He darts forward, bowling me over and pressing me up against a tree, where the thousands of spiders creep all over my face and arms and legs. I shake them off, but more descend from the branches above. Meanwhile, troll saliva is dripping all over my forehead, and mushrooms are springing up from my skin.
Mushroom troll…
"Listen, mushroom troll, I just spent a long time under the ocean, and I don't need to smell like rotten fish for a second time today. I happen to be Prussian, not Norwegian. So you can kindly give that adorable little boy some of your dandruff, or I'll show you the cosmic power within."
"You have no authority here. Your magic is unnatural in this world, of course."
"It's unnatural in my own world. Is this up for debate?"
Crap. That made him mad. His bulbous belly is squishing up against me like a squishy, slimy slug. Mushrooms are consuming my face wherever the spit drips. His musty breath must contain spores, because I feel an itchiness on the inside of my throat and lungs — popping into tiny little mushrooms that grow to clog my windpipe.
I sneeze, launching myself backwards and felling the tree with an enormous crunch. Scrambling up, I thrust my hand toward the oncoming troll. I don't know what I'm doing, but hand-thrusting works in anime, doesn't it?
Something is happening. I see little warps opening around my wrist like reality's a cheese grater. Energies of various colors and lusters are pouring into my open palm. My body feels warm. I'm channeling power from at least five different dimensions at once, and it feels incredible.
"No one talks down to my Luddy in any world," I snarl. Then my fingers stretch wider, and the sphere of ultraviolet light is launched from my palm, smacking the troll right in the stomach. He flies backwards, leaving whole trees in his wake. When he finally lands, his body shrinks with an uncomfortable bubbling noise. He's out cold. I rush over to see him, but I can only make out the charred patch of fungus-y skin on his chest before I'm down on my knees, coughing and hacking. The mushrooms of before are fully clogging my throat. Oh! If I could only fricking shapeshift and turn into a frog so I could breathe through my skin!
"He got you!" Ludwig exclaims. He's at my side immediately, rummaging through his pocket until he finds a bottle of purple fluid. Uncorking it, he shoves it into my hand and orders me to drink.
"Antifungal potion. Drink it immediately, or you'll choke."
I nod, bringing the stuff to my reddening face, then quaff it in one go. It's a taste I can't even describe. Like salty sausage mixed with cotton. Instantly, the mushrooms in my throat dissolve, and I gasp in my breath. All it takes is a little mortal danger to make a pan-dimensional immortal feel scared for a minute.
"Thanks. Did you make this stuff?"
The kid beams and nods. "Yep! After I got attacked by that troll, my brother used some to cure me, and then we had to brew up some more! It works!"
"Then you're an excellent little wizard, Ludwig. You've earned the approval of the Great Prussia of 11 Dimensions, and that is something to be proud of."
He cocks his head, not quite understanding. Then I snap my fingers again, and a little eagle shape weaves itself onto the front of his robe.
"So cool! Thank you, Great Prussia! Now I can get the dandruff I need! Back to Piyo Tower I go!"
"Piyo Tower? I'd call it Piyo Fortress, if I were you. Much more ominous. Your brother's a dark wizard, right?"
"Unfortunately," Ludwig says with a smirk.
That's it. I'm done. Little Ludwig being cheeky. My body can't handle it. The rate of atomic annihilation exceeds the rate of fat cell division, and without even trying, I warp out of existence.
~N~
Yeah, that's some shameless promotion for my other fic — Hetafata: The Snarled Circle Chronicles. Lud and his friends meet the troll in the episode "In White Spider Woods," and luckily he escapes!
Updated by Syntax-N FanFiction . Net July 24th, 2020. Reposters cursed.