"We've got a meeting in a little while, y'know. Are you gonna be alright for then?" Alfred asked the display screen with Arthur's image on it.
The Brit was ill for the first time in a century. Countries' immune systems were incredibly advanced, and the only times they did get sick were when their people were going through some sort of epidemic.
"It's just a cold, Alfred. I probably got it from Joy," Arthur replied, wiping his nose with a tissue like a sir.
"Dude, we don't get colds. That's the thing," Alfred pointed out. "Don't you think something's wrong with this picture?"
"Of course I do. I'm not an idiot," Arthur snapped irritably. "Funny you should bring this up when you yourself didn't know what a cold was for a long time."
"That's because we don't get sick!" the younger exclaimed while throwing his arms into the air like he had just flipped a table. "Jeez, I'm tryin' to say something's definitely wrong, Iggy!"
"Don't call me that," Arthur added. "I understand that, git. Don't think I don't. I wa planning on doing some research about this, in case something really is wrong. It could be an imbalance of magical levels or-- Are you even listening to me?"
Jokingly, Alfred snapped his head up and looked around blearily. "I'm awake, I swear!"
"Agh, you're impossible," Arthur stated as he made to cut the call off.
"Wait, wait!"
"What is it?"
"I know our kids aren't exactly countries like us, but they don't usually get sick either, right?" Alfred asked.
"Usually. What's your point?" Arthur inquired.
"Nekochi's sick, has been since yesterday. It's just a cold, but I'm kinda worried now that you both have basically the same symptoms." The American couldn't help but wring his hands a little as he spoke of his daughter's woes. "You don't think something bad is going on, do you?"
"Not especially," Arthur replied. "Call Kadi if you want to, but I have to go."
They bade each other farewell and disconnected. Alfred turned away from the display screen and went into his daughter's heavily decorated bedroom to check up on her. His head was poked around the doorway and he smiled at her.
"How're ya doing, Chi?" he asked softly.
Nekochi, who hadn't been asleep and was staring blankly at her television, looked at her father and smiled a little. "Little better, Dad."
"Hey, cool! Want anything?" he asked. "Ice cream was always a good thing when I got injured."
"I'm just sick, though," she pointed out.
"True. And I got injured trying to get to the ice cream that one time," he added, a reminiscent look on his face before he shook it off and sat on the edge of her bed. "Did you take your temperature recently?"
"Yeah. One hundred point eight," Nekochi said while she tightened her unkempt, multicolored ponytail.
"Hey, it's going down!" America said happily. "Okay, I'll be in the office if you need me, hon. Call me when you want something for lunch, m'kay?"
"M'kay, Dad," Nekochi responded, smiling at the peck she got on the forehead from her father.
When America opened the door of his home office, though, he sneezed and immediately froze up. 'No way... Am I getting sick, too?'
"Heroes don't get sick," he laughed, trying to push it from his mind as he went in to work on his boring, unheroic paperwork.
~
"Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!" I shouted with each consecutive kick, punch, or swipe of an arm or a leg. Yong Soo was fighting back with purpose, really getting into it.
It had been two weeks since my first day of training with these guys, and to say that I had improved was a little of an understatement.
My bare foot slammed into Yong Soo's side and he was down! I had actually done it!
No, my victory was short-lived. He tackled my legs and continued the fight with gusto.
When it was over, I wiped the sweat off my face with a towel and sat down next to him, accepting the water bottle he held out to me. "So?" I asked breathlessly. "How'm I doing?"
"You're really kicking ass," he laughed. "But not my ass."
"I dunno about that," I replied cheekily as I sipped the cold water. "You're the only one I'm fighting at the moment."
"I'm still pulling my punches a little, da ze," he explained. "You're not up to that level just yet."
"But I'm improving," I stated.
"Yup!"
"Good~" I sang as I laid on my back and let my arms fall to either side of me.
To my great surprise (and pleasure), I just so happened to see a dark shape dart away at the corner of my eye, and I tracked it without moving. Could it be who I thought it was...?
'Leon, I see you there~'
"Well, come on. Let's do another round," Korea suggested, and I nodded while getting up. We moved back to the fighting ring and took up our practiced stances, though I kept Leon in my sight as much as possible. He didn't try to startle me with firecrackers this time, which I was grateful for, but I was prepared for it this time, whenever he chose to try.
"Ha! Ha! Ha!"
~
"Arright. Are you ready?" Japan asked as I held my sword with both hands.
I'd graduated from using a wooden practice sword to using a real one a few days ago, and I was still trying to get used to its unfamiliar weight and feel. He had a bow and quiver with arrows, one of which was nocked on the bowstring and about to be pulled back.
I nodded, holding up my sword defensively. The point of this exercise was to help me get into an archer's defenses without getting shot by an arrow. The ones Japan shot at me were harmless, capped so it wouldn't cause much more damage than a bruise, but the practice wasn't any less critical to my training.
I'd been told that we had no idea what the Darkness would fight me with, so I had to be ready to battle any and all types of weapons. However, we knew that every Vindicator fought with a sword, so that's why I had one with me now.
"Ready."
Kiku fired, and I managed to block it with the flat of my blade. A dull ringing sound reverberated around me as my hands vibrated a bit painfully. There was no time to steady the sword, however, as another and another came at me, aimed at random parts of my body. I had to be ready for every one, and I grinned as I kept blocking them despite the attempts Kiku made to feint to one side and shoot at the other.
"Now try to get croser!" Japan called to me, and I crept a few feet forward, keeping on the balls of my feet. The arrows still came, and one caught the edge of my upper arm, but I shrugged off the slight stinging sensation. I could handle more than that!
A few more feet... A few more... I was getting quite close now, and Japan's arrows were coming much more frequently. With the closer proximity, I had less time to dodge and took a couple more in the leg.
He sighed, having noticed, and lowered his bow. "You wourd have farren and been in great pain if those arrows had been sharp, Arice-chan. Sorry, that wasn't a pass."
I cursed under my breath and lowered my sword, looking down forlornly. Of course, I happened to glance up right as Kiku let his last arrow fly, aimed right at my chest. My sword was coming up--!
Clang!
It spun away from me, bending slightly from the force before straightening and falling to the ground.
"Ha!" I exclaimed triumphantly.
Kiku smiled softly. "Good. You did better than rast time."
Last time I had lost focus and ended up with arrows "in" my stomach. The bruises were still there, too, and they dully ached in the background of my mind.
In the foreground, however, I was focusing on collecting the discarded arrows and returning them to my "sensei".
"Here ya go," I said, placing the spent arrows in Japan's outstretched hand.
"Arigato," he replied, making them all face the same way as he put them back in his black, sleek quiver. "Sharr we go to fighting against swords now?"
"Sure," I answered nonchalantly. It meant a lot of soreness in my arms and legs, but I was used to that by then. It was commonplace for me.
"By the way, I noticed the date," Kiku commented as we walked to the training mat used for swordplay. "It is armost your birthday, isn't it?"
"What's today?" I asked.
"February 11th."
"Seriously?" I exclaimed, looking around me. "Yeah, my birthday's in three days!"
"Werr, I know I won't see you on your birthday so happy birthday," he told me.
I smiled sincerely at him. "Aw, thanks, Nihon. I'm so excited to go back and see my family~"
"I can imagine you wourd be. After arr, they have not seen you in a few weeks."
"They might not recognize me under all this perfectly sculpted muscle," I joked, flexing the growing muscles of a still fairly bony arm.
I caught an amused smile on his face. "I am sure they wirr be too happy to see you at first that they won't even realize you've gotten stronger."
"Are you saying it's not that noticeable?" I asked with mock appal.
"No, no, I onry meant--"
"Nihon," I interrupted with a smirk. "It's okay, I was just messing with you."
"I know," he sighed. "I suppose I am getting a rittre rusty at reading the mood and refraining from speaking."
"You've had to speak out a lot lately," I sympathized. "Especially with the stuff going on around the world. Which I really admire, by the way."
"A-Arigato," he stammered a little, turning a shade redder at the compliment. "I am simpry trying to do what I think is right."
"Exactly. It's what we all should be doing more and more, as nations."
By then, we were really just stalling before getting back to training.
Japan chuckled. "Arright. No more wasting time distracting me. Ret's do some drirrs." (drills)
"Aw, if we have to," I whined jokingly.
~
I stood at the edge of a very, very long drop; I was unable to glimpse anywhere near the bottom of it.
I turned away from looking down and saw a seething, bubbling black mass of what looked like solidified shadow. The sight instilled a feeling of terror in my heart, and I took a tentative step back when it surged toward me.
"Waiting... So... Long!" a voice that sounded like thousands, or even millions, condensed into one roared at me, making my stomach plummet.
There was only about a foot and a half left between where I stood and the edge of the cliff. I threw up a hand and tried to summon light to shoot at it, but nothing came. I had no magic?
Its horrifying voice chuckled deep within its swirling mass of a body, and to my fright a half-foot of the ground between my feet and the edge fell away. Now there was hardly anywhere for me to go! Not that there had been anywhere to begin with.
I threw up another hand and aimed my palms at it, digging deep down for any drop of magic left within me. Where was it? Why couldn't I find it?
"Help!" I cried out multiple times while looking everywhere for someone who might come to my rescue. Sadly, it was just me and this monster at the edge of a cliff.
"Waiting... No more waiting..." It stated, lunging forward. I batted at the tendrils of solid shadow that reached for me, trying to draw me in, but that just made my foot take a step backwards into open air.
My balance was gone! I was falling!
The wind whipped at my tangled and unruly hair as I fell with increasing speed. I wasn't facing where I was going, but looking up at where I'd been. The monster, that dark creature, was waving to me and laughing maniacally, though the sound was getting smaller and smaller as I fell farther.
Time seemed to slow for a bit, and during those few moments I had a moment of clarity, maybe even clairvoyance. My eyes widened, a gasp escaped my lips, and then--
SPLAT.
"No!" I screamed at the top of my lungs as I bolted up in bed, hyperventilating hysterically and covered in a sheen of cold sweat. My arms were around my chest in an instant, constricting protectively until it hurt.
My light flicked on a moment later, and Xiao Mei was in the doorway, looking at me worriedly. "Alice, what is it? What happened?"
I shook my head, trying to cease my rocking back and forth. "I'm... I'm okay," I gasped out.
Maybe I wasn't convincing enough. Taiwan was at my side suddenly and moving some of the hair out of my wide-open eyes. "What was your dream about?"
It was with a shaky, choking voice that I told her what I had dreamt. Her eyes saddened, and she drew me into a gentle hug.
"It'll be alright, Alice. I don't think you have too much to worry about. You're strong, and you have experience fighting. You'll win," she assured me.
Another tear leaked out of my eye and trickled down my cheek to land on her shoulder and soak into her pajama shirt. Why was it so hard to believe that was true?
---------------------------------------------
Yup... Serious stuff's going on, yo. Will you be brave enough to see it through to the end?
Maybe, maybe not. We'll have to wait and see.
On another note, the Student War is coming up! :D Stay tuned for adorbale ChrAila scenes!
BOOKIE OUT, PEACE!