Post by Germany on May 31, 2011 1:25:04 GMT -5
A/N: Er, yeah. Just as the title says. This post takes place in Germany and Poland's room, and would be a great place to start if you're eager for an encounter with Germany right away, though other parts of the mansion/grounds may be visited in it as well.
Wow, this is a large room. Two beds, too. I wonder who my roommate is?
These were Germany’s first thoughts upon entering the room he was to reside in for the duration of this little relations-strengthening boss ploy, however long that ended up being. His boss, Christian Wulff, had been rather vague about that, answering him with “Oh, as long as it takes. Maybe a week, perhaps.” when he had asked, and he hadn’t even thought to ask Angela, who had been particularly chatty yesterday with her advice and wardrobe suggestions.
Personally, Ludwig didn’t see why his presence at this little friendship-enhancing get-together was necessary. Politically he had at least diplomatic relations with most countries these days, and even the sometimes-strained relations he had with Russia and Poland weren’t serious, though on a personal level he still considered Poland an irritant at best and harbored especially deep, black grudges against Russia. But hell, going couldn’t hurt anything, especially since Israel was going to be there. A busier-than-usual schedule had kept him from seeing her for a month, and the thought of taking a little time off now to vacation with his girlfriend in a big mansion in the United States had been too enticing to pass up, even if over a dozen other countries were going to be there with them.
Speaking of which, he still didn’t know who all was coming, though he had already either seen or encountered America, Japan, Finland, and some female nation with dark brown hair and light brown skin who looked vaguely familiar but whose name escaped him.
Hm. Now that I’m here, I can take out my map and check.
Wulff had provided him with a sealed envelope containing a map of the place before he had left Berlin, with the specific command not to open it until he had arrived at the mansion. The map had all the bedrooms labeled with the countries that were to share them, and the pairings were non-negotiable, he’d said. Naturally, all the secrecy and the ‘non-negotiable’ clause had only piqued Germany’s curiosity, but as tempting as it was to try to cheat and look while he was on the airplane he knew better than to waste his time. The only thing he’d known in advance about the arrangements was that he would be staying in one of the big bedrooms on the third floor. Since there were only two to choose from, he’d randomly picked one, figuring he had a 50-50 chance of being right. It would be a simple matter to move across the hall if he’d guessed wrong.
Anxious to see what he was in for, he hurried over to the kingsize bed on the right side of the room and set his suitcase on it, noting with pleasure how clean, taut, and perfectly symmetrical the big dark blue blanket was, how the paper-white pillow-cases were straight and unwrinkled. Indeed, the whole room was immaculate and picture-perfect; Alfred’s maids had done an excellent job. He opened his suitcase and found his envelop right on top of his clothes where he had left it. Taking it up in his hands, he carefully tore it open along the top and lifted a single paper out. Sure enough, unfolding it revealed the floor plans: turned out there was a basement, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd floor.
Alright.
Onto the guests…
Three seconds in and Germany was already raising a brow at some of the names he was seeing: Ukraine…North Korea.
North Korea?! The hell? He doesn’t have any friends, and he HATES America! True, the point of this get-together was to improve international relations, but that North Korea would not only be invited, but actually come was pretty damn shocking. It would have had to have been Kim-Jong Il, he reasoned, he must have forced North Korea to come. Why he would was a mystery — he had never seemed to care much about what the rest of the world thought of him and his country before — but from what Germany knew of the nation himself he didn’t seem like the type to volunteer on his own accord.
North Korea was sharing a room with Canada. An odd pairing, but one that actually made a tiny degree of sense considering that Canada was generally non-confrontational, quiet, and almost invisible most of the time. He did kind of look like America, though, which meant he probably wasn’t the best choice for an America-hating nation’s roommate.
Oh well. Wasn’t his problem.
He came to Russia’s name, and an austere frown darkened his face. His boss had sent him to stay in a mansion with Russia?
Naturally. There always has to be a catch.
Well, he wouldn’t go out of his way to seek a fight with Ivan, but his boss was out of his mind if he thought a sleepover was going to erase all the physical and mental pain Ivan had put him through, all the bitterness and hatred he still felt towards the Russian for the heinous things he had done to him and his people during and after World War II, for his role in Prussia’s death, for the Berlin Wall. Maybe some of his people were ready to move on, but Germany himself was not about to just forgive and forget. If Ivan had only fought against him and his soldiers in the war he might have been able to — after all, he’d killed his share of Ivan’s soldiers, including Ivan himself for as many times as Ivan had ‘killed’ him — but Gilbert’s death had slashed deep into his soul like a cold razor, completely gutting him from the inside out, and the following decades of abuse and subsequent mental instability, memory loss, and humility he had endured at Ivan’s hands could have embittered the noblest of souls.
Russia was roomed with Sweden, which brought a faint smirk to his lips and made him chuckle in a nasty way inside. Last he’d heard those two hadn’t been on the best of terms; served that oversized sadistic Russian bastard right.
His smirk quickly evaporated, however, when he saw that Israel would be sharing a room with America rather than him, and when his eyes glided over a big room on the third floor labeled with France and South Korea, his expression changed yet again.
France and South Korea in the same room?! And both Koreas are here?! Who the hell thought this would be a good plan?! His eyes widened appreciably, surprise flickering over his features. Before he had the chance to come fully to grips with having a pair of bi-sexual, overly grabby, lust-starved men for neighbors and all the ingredients necessary to re-ignite the Korean war, however, he saw his name paired with the last nation he would have ever expected, and his mind was blown somewhere past Saturn.
POLAND?! HE PAIRED ME WITH POLAND?! All coherent thought-processes screeched to a grinding halt. For a moment he just stood there, mouth slightly agape, staring dumbly at the vile paper he held between his hands.
Then the wheels in his head started turning again.
NEIN! This can’t be right… He blinked like an owl at the paper and started to make a face. But it didn’t help — it was definitely ‘Polen’ written there, not Portugal or Palua.
This….this was cruel. Here Israel was in the mansion with him, and they would make perfect roommates, and his boss had given him Poland?
Oh, and Wulff knew what he was doing, too, otherwise he wouldn’t have put such emphasis on the roommate pairs being non-negotiable.
A little note at the bottom of the page informed him that Seychelles and Lithuania would be present, but room arrangements had not yet been made for them.
Ludwig barely noticed.
Livid, he tossed the paper onto his bed — the map confirmed he’d chosen his room correctly — took his classy black cell phone from his pocket, and started at once texting a message to the sneaky rat who had done this to him.
**Have I done something to upset you, President Wulff? I just found out who you roomed me with, and only one other nation would have been worse. /**
His finger hesitated over the next button.
Actually, that wasn’t true.
He deleted a few letters and changed the last part of the second sentence.
**….would have been as bad. I know you said the rooming arrangements were non-negotiable, but is there *anything* I can do to get you to allow me to swap Poland for Israel? We get along so much better.
P.S. Are you and the other Heads of State trying to start World War Three? I’m wondering how Russia and North Korea fit into the relations-strengthening picture. [/b] /**
There. Hard as it was for him sometimes, he’d found that a little tact, respect, and politeness went a long way when dealing with bosses, and thankfully it was far easier for him to come off that way via written word than in person. He had more time to think over and compose his replies.
He didn’t expect a serious answer to his last question, but he just had to throw it out there.
As he hit ‘send’ he noticed he had an unread text message. From Adira Bat Ami — Israel.
Opening it, the first thing he noticed was that she’d opted to write it in his language instead of the nation common language. When he started to actually read, the next thing he noticed was that her written German hadn’t improved a great deal over the years: the grammar was really, really off in some places, and as usual she butchered popular sayings. Nonetheless, it was incredibly sweet of her to try, and going by context he could figure out what she’d meant to say. Well, 95% of what she’d meant to say, at least.
In better spirits, he sat down on the bed next to his suitcase and began his reply in German. She should be able to understand most — if not all — of it, and anyway seeing words in their proper forms could only help her in her endeavor to learn.
**Adira,
I’ve missed you a lot too. I can’t wait to see you again and spend some more quality time with you, even if we have to do it in a mansion surrounded by other nations.
I still can’t believe I got that obnoxious air-headed nuisance for a roommate. Either I did something to piss my boss off, or he has a sick sense of humor. I texted him a moment ago asking if I could swap him for you. It probably won’t get me anywhere, but I tried.
Yes, your German is getting better. The grammar is still sinking you, but I hear German grammar is pretty thorny for non-native speakers to learn, so don’t feel too bad about it. And I’d definitely be interested in learning your language — it’d really come in handy for when I come to visit you in your own lands.
Anyway, you’re probably already here and I just missed you when I came in. We need to meet up!
Love,
~Ludwig [/i]/ **
It still felt so odd to sign off his letters and messages with the word ‘love’, but in a good way. Having a steady girlfriend — and one he had so much in common with at that — was a pleasantly new experience for him, and he really did love her. Besides, she’d signed her letter with ‘x’s and ‘o’s, and while he couldn’t bring himself to respond in kind he did want to make sure she knew he’d noticed and felt the same.
After sending the message he stood up and slid his phone back into his jeans pocket. Shutting and locking his suitcase, he slipped it under his bed so it wouldn’t be immediately obvious to a certain disrespectful Pole and started for the door to search for his girlfriend.
A/N: ** = The start of German being written, / ** = the end of the written German passage. I don’t know enough German to write it out myself, and I don’t trust those online translators, so unfortunately we’ll just have to pretend it’s in German. I don’t use this system for denoting the language of thoughts or speech.
Polen = Poland in German[/size]
_______________________________________________
Wow, this is a large room. Two beds, too. I wonder who my roommate is?
These were Germany’s first thoughts upon entering the room he was to reside in for the duration of this little relations-strengthening boss ploy, however long that ended up being. His boss, Christian Wulff, had been rather vague about that, answering him with “Oh, as long as it takes. Maybe a week, perhaps.” when he had asked, and he hadn’t even thought to ask Angela, who had been particularly chatty yesterday with her advice and wardrobe suggestions.
Personally, Ludwig didn’t see why his presence at this little friendship-enhancing get-together was necessary. Politically he had at least diplomatic relations with most countries these days, and even the sometimes-strained relations he had with Russia and Poland weren’t serious, though on a personal level he still considered Poland an irritant at best and harbored especially deep, black grudges against Russia. But hell, going couldn’t hurt anything, especially since Israel was going to be there. A busier-than-usual schedule had kept him from seeing her for a month, and the thought of taking a little time off now to vacation with his girlfriend in a big mansion in the United States had been too enticing to pass up, even if over a dozen other countries were going to be there with them.
Speaking of which, he still didn’t know who all was coming, though he had already either seen or encountered America, Japan, Finland, and some female nation with dark brown hair and light brown skin who looked vaguely familiar but whose name escaped him.
Hm. Now that I’m here, I can take out my map and check.
Wulff had provided him with a sealed envelope containing a map of the place before he had left Berlin, with the specific command not to open it until he had arrived at the mansion. The map had all the bedrooms labeled with the countries that were to share them, and the pairings were non-negotiable, he’d said. Naturally, all the secrecy and the ‘non-negotiable’ clause had only piqued Germany’s curiosity, but as tempting as it was to try to cheat and look while he was on the airplane he knew better than to waste his time. The only thing he’d known in advance about the arrangements was that he would be staying in one of the big bedrooms on the third floor. Since there were only two to choose from, he’d randomly picked one, figuring he had a 50-50 chance of being right. It would be a simple matter to move across the hall if he’d guessed wrong.
Anxious to see what he was in for, he hurried over to the kingsize bed on the right side of the room and set his suitcase on it, noting with pleasure how clean, taut, and perfectly symmetrical the big dark blue blanket was, how the paper-white pillow-cases were straight and unwrinkled. Indeed, the whole room was immaculate and picture-perfect; Alfred’s maids had done an excellent job. He opened his suitcase and found his envelop right on top of his clothes where he had left it. Taking it up in his hands, he carefully tore it open along the top and lifted a single paper out. Sure enough, unfolding it revealed the floor plans: turned out there was a basement, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd floor.
Alright.
Onto the guests…
Three seconds in and Germany was already raising a brow at some of the names he was seeing: Ukraine…North Korea.
North Korea?! The hell? He doesn’t have any friends, and he HATES America! True, the point of this get-together was to improve international relations, but that North Korea would not only be invited, but actually come was pretty damn shocking. It would have had to have been Kim-Jong Il, he reasoned, he must have forced North Korea to come. Why he would was a mystery — he had never seemed to care much about what the rest of the world thought of him and his country before — but from what Germany knew of the nation himself he didn’t seem like the type to volunteer on his own accord.
North Korea was sharing a room with Canada. An odd pairing, but one that actually made a tiny degree of sense considering that Canada was generally non-confrontational, quiet, and almost invisible most of the time. He did kind of look like America, though, which meant he probably wasn’t the best choice for an America-hating nation’s roommate.
Oh well. Wasn’t his problem.
He came to Russia’s name, and an austere frown darkened his face. His boss had sent him to stay in a mansion with Russia?
Naturally. There always has to be a catch.
Well, he wouldn’t go out of his way to seek a fight with Ivan, but his boss was out of his mind if he thought a sleepover was going to erase all the physical and mental pain Ivan had put him through, all the bitterness and hatred he still felt towards the Russian for the heinous things he had done to him and his people during and after World War II, for his role in Prussia’s death, for the Berlin Wall. Maybe some of his people were ready to move on, but Germany himself was not about to just forgive and forget. If Ivan had only fought against him and his soldiers in the war he might have been able to — after all, he’d killed his share of Ivan’s soldiers, including Ivan himself for as many times as Ivan had ‘killed’ him — but Gilbert’s death had slashed deep into his soul like a cold razor, completely gutting him from the inside out, and the following decades of abuse and subsequent mental instability, memory loss, and humility he had endured at Ivan’s hands could have embittered the noblest of souls.
Russia was roomed with Sweden, which brought a faint smirk to his lips and made him chuckle in a nasty way inside. Last he’d heard those two hadn’t been on the best of terms; served that oversized sadistic Russian bastard right.
His smirk quickly evaporated, however, when he saw that Israel would be sharing a room with America rather than him, and when his eyes glided over a big room on the third floor labeled with France and South Korea, his expression changed yet again.
France and South Korea in the same room?! And both Koreas are here?! Who the hell thought this would be a good plan?! His eyes widened appreciably, surprise flickering over his features. Before he had the chance to come fully to grips with having a pair of bi-sexual, overly grabby, lust-starved men for neighbors and all the ingredients necessary to re-ignite the Korean war, however, he saw his name paired with the last nation he would have ever expected, and his mind was blown somewhere past Saturn.
POLAND?! HE PAIRED ME WITH POLAND?! All coherent thought-processes screeched to a grinding halt. For a moment he just stood there, mouth slightly agape, staring dumbly at the vile paper he held between his hands.
Then the wheels in his head started turning again.
NEIN! This can’t be right… He blinked like an owl at the paper and started to make a face. But it didn’t help — it was definitely ‘Polen’ written there, not Portugal or Palua.
This….this was cruel. Here Israel was in the mansion with him, and they would make perfect roommates, and his boss had given him Poland?
Oh, and Wulff knew what he was doing, too, otherwise he wouldn’t have put such emphasis on the roommate pairs being non-negotiable.
A little note at the bottom of the page informed him that Seychelles and Lithuania would be present, but room arrangements had not yet been made for them.
Ludwig barely noticed.
Livid, he tossed the paper onto his bed — the map confirmed he’d chosen his room correctly — took his classy black cell phone from his pocket, and started at once texting a message to the sneaky rat who had done this to him.
**Have I done something to upset you, President Wulff? I just found out who you roomed me with, and only one other nation would have been worse. /**
His finger hesitated over the next button.
Actually, that wasn’t true.
He deleted a few letters and changed the last part of the second sentence.
**….would have been as bad. I know you said the rooming arrangements were non-negotiable, but is there *anything* I can do to get you to allow me to swap Poland for Israel? We get along so much better.
P.S. Are you and the other Heads of State trying to start World War Three? I’m wondering how Russia and North Korea fit into the relations-strengthening picture. [/b] /**
There. Hard as it was for him sometimes, he’d found that a little tact, respect, and politeness went a long way when dealing with bosses, and thankfully it was far easier for him to come off that way via written word than in person. He had more time to think over and compose his replies.
He didn’t expect a serious answer to his last question, but he just had to throw it out there.
As he hit ‘send’ he noticed he had an unread text message. From Adira Bat Ami — Israel.
Opening it, the first thing he noticed was that she’d opted to write it in his language instead of the nation common language. When he started to actually read, the next thing he noticed was that her written German hadn’t improved a great deal over the years: the grammar was really, really off in some places, and as usual she butchered popular sayings. Nonetheless, it was incredibly sweet of her to try, and going by context he could figure out what she’d meant to say. Well, 95% of what she’d meant to say, at least.
In better spirits, he sat down on the bed next to his suitcase and began his reply in German. She should be able to understand most — if not all — of it, and anyway seeing words in their proper forms could only help her in her endeavor to learn.
**Adira,
I’ve missed you a lot too. I can’t wait to see you again and spend some more quality time with you, even if we have to do it in a mansion surrounded by other nations.
I still can’t believe I got that obnoxious air-headed nuisance for a roommate. Either I did something to piss my boss off, or he has a sick sense of humor. I texted him a moment ago asking if I could swap him for you. It probably won’t get me anywhere, but I tried.
Yes, your German is getting better. The grammar is still sinking you, but I hear German grammar is pretty thorny for non-native speakers to learn, so don’t feel too bad about it. And I’d definitely be interested in learning your language — it’d really come in handy for when I come to visit you in your own lands.
Anyway, you’re probably already here and I just missed you when I came in. We need to meet up!
Love,
~Ludwig [/i]/ **
It still felt so odd to sign off his letters and messages with the word ‘love’, but in a good way. Having a steady girlfriend — and one he had so much in common with at that — was a pleasantly new experience for him, and he really did love her. Besides, she’d signed her letter with ‘x’s and ‘o’s, and while he couldn’t bring himself to respond in kind he did want to make sure she knew he’d noticed and felt the same.
After sending the message he stood up and slid his phone back into his jeans pocket. Shutting and locking his suitcase, he slipped it under his bed so it wouldn’t be immediately obvious to a certain disrespectful Pole and started for the door to search for his girlfriend.
______________________________________________________
A/N: ** = The start of German being written, / ** = the end of the written German passage. I don’t know enough German to write it out myself, and I don’t trust those online translators, so unfortunately we’ll just have to pretend it’s in German. I don’t use this system for denoting the language of thoughts or speech.
Polen = Poland in German[/size]
