We're counting down the days to Christmas with some Hetalia pairings from Monday to Friday – Christmas Eve! Yayz!

The structure of this will go USUK, RoChu, USUK, GerIta and then USUK again, not in chronological historical order. None of them are R-rated, fyi. The bias towards USUK (there being three of them) is actually not my own personal (totally-existent-OTP) bias and comes from the fact that three of the fics that make this short-story-set up were originally written for a Christmas fanbook project I was involved in. Details about the fanbook itself are provided in a link in my profile but honestly I don't actually know what happened with that in the end. o.O I don't think there is actually going to be a fanbook after all, at any rate.

But, well, I didn't want these to go to waste! I originally wrote three USUK oneshots and one RoChu one for the fanbook. One of the original USUK fics has been replaced in this collection with a different fic involving the two of them (eh, it was okay but a bit... idk, depressing) and the set is completed by a brand new GerIta that I wrote specially for this.

And so, without further ado, five gold rings. =)

UKUS – The First World War

"So I guess this is kind of your Christmas tradition now, huh?"

The shiver was present even in Alfred's voice, a sort of slight shudder beneath the skin of his speech; he was stuffed-up, too, from sneezing over and over. It was just a cold, just a measly little cold, but in conditions like this it could worsen, could congeal in the chest and fester in the lungs, grow roots in his bones so that he shook when he coughed—

"Hmm?" Arthur looked up from his glass of rum, his flaking cigarette pressed across the cold circle of glass as he clenched both in the same hand. "I'm sorry, what? I wasn't listening."

"This." Alfred ventured his arms – in full uniform, mind – out from beneath the thin, ragged blanket and gestured vaguely around the dug-out. "This... sort of—"

"Complete bollocks, you mean?" Arthur smirked at him – but it was tired, cynical, drained of his Pax-Britannica-arrogance of pre-1914. "I suppose so. I got tired of lavish parties and roasted goose and plum pudding and all that nonsense, you see. I decided I'd prefer to spend my Christmases from 1914 onwards cowering underground in a hand-dug hellhole drinking myself into oblivion."

"Arthur, I saw you at Ludwig's Christmas parties in the late 1800s," Alfred pointed out wryly, wrapping the blanket back around himself. "You don't need the excuse of shells and tanks and gunfire to drink yourself into oblivion."

Arthur grinned dryly at him, switching his rum to the other hand so that he could drag on his cigarette. Alfred noticed – and had noticed before – that his hands shook ever so slightly. He had never seen that in Arthur before all this—

His breath caught in his lungs and he started coughing. Arthur rolled his eyes at him.

"Good God, man," he muttered, "do die quietly, won't you?" He reached across and pressed his rum into Alfred's hand. "There, get that down you – it'll put out the fire."

Alfred gripped blindly at the glass and drank. It tasted awful, hot and sharp and bitter, God only knew what was in the stuff, supplies being as short as they were; but it quenched the cough, the lesser of two evils as it set his throat ablaze and overpowered the persistent chesty irritation there.

"Th-thanks," he muttered breathlessly, giving the glass back; there was still a faint film of rum swaying at the bottom of the dirty tumbler, which Arthur drained by tipping his head right back and flicking out his tongue to catch the final few drops from the tilted glass held above his head. Alfred watched the flash of his pale throat over his filthy shirt collar and tattered tie, noting that the whole motion was the most Arthur had actually moved in about an hour.

"That was the last of it," Arthur murmured, more to himself, shaking his thoroughly-empty glass. "Dash it all, now we'll have to wait until January for more supplies..."

"Oh, Christmas is all about over-indulgence, right?" Alfred teased. "What does it matter if you finished off the rum?"

"I'm afraid all you'll have to over-indulge on here is your imagination, Alfred," Arthur replied blandly, setting his glass down rather heavily and turning his attention back to his cigarette, what little left of it there was. "Or I think there's some chocolate..."

"Ha, fuckin' fire-fuel, you mean." Alfred sniffled, shivering, and actually saw his breath mist on the air. "Gee, guess I'll just have to go with my imagination."

"A wise choice," Arthur agreed, finishing his cigarette and tossing it onto the floor, crushing it with the mud-caked heel of his boot. "I think I'd rather take that damnable frog's stewed snail soup over half the stuff they send up here for us..."

Alfred pulled a face.

"Eww, snails ain't no good for a Christmas feast!" he said earnestly. "Don't go putting stuff like that in my head, Arthur!"

"Ah, my apologies," Arthur sighed, bunching up close to Alfred on the narrow rickety bed. "I forgot how easily distracted you are."

"'S'okay," Alfred murmured, reaching out and pulling Arthur in close to his chest so that he could wrap the thin blanket around them both. "So, about that big old Christmas spread of ours...?"

"Oh, now it's ours?" Arthur hummed thoughtfully to himself, making himself comfortable against Alfred's chest. "Well, duck is traditional – or goose, roasted over an open fire—"

"Can we have turkey too?" Alfred interrupted excitedly.

"Yes, of course we can."

"Chestnuts?"

"Yes, those too—"

"Oh, and sweet potatoes!" Alfred trilled happily. "And stuffing and—"

"Alfred, this isn't Thanksgiving."

"Tch, Thanksgiving is just an excuse to stuff my face twice. Well, we'll have everything! Honey-roast ham, too, and carrots and parsnips and cornbread!" Alfred paused, thinking. "Um, well, I guess we need drinks, too."

"Mulled wine," Arthur supplied immediately. "Brandy. Spiced rum."

"God, you're like an alcohol inventory!" Alfred laughed. "Well, okay, but we have to have eggnog too!"

"...You know I invented that, don't you?"

"And then I hijacked it fair and square." Alfred rocked Arthur in his arms, the movement creating the slightest spark of body heat. "Hey, don't forget that we need candy, too! Candy canes, right?"

"And sugared almonds. And real chocolate." Arthur smiled. "You forgot desserts."

"Oh yeah! Pumpkin pie—oh, and apple pie too, don't forget that."

"As long as you don't forget mince pies or Christmas pudding."

"I won't." Alfred searched around under the blanket and found Arthur's hand – it was as cold as his, his bones brittle and his nails ragged and dirty. "And sugar dates and nuts to finish."

"And then you'll go and lie in front of the fire and groan all evening that you've eaten too much," Arthur sighed; Alfred felt him lace their icy fingers together.

Alfred grinned and rested his chin on top of Arthur's head, pleasantly aware that they were becoming more and more intertwined with every motion on either of their parts – if only to try and conserve body heat by clinging to each other's shivering forms.

"Well, that's my Christmas tradition," he said; he winced as he felt his stomach practically turn in on itself with hunger, growling audibly and aggressively. "Argh, too bad thinking about our awesome Christmas dinner is reminding me that I'm fuckin' starving."

Arthur shifted in his grip, cuddling closer.

"Me too," he muttered. "Well, thank you for joining me in my Christmas tradition this year, Alfred. It's been a pleasure."

Alfred laughed.

"Liar."

"No, really; or, at least, it's been more companionable than past years. I've never felt much like snuggling up to Francis."

"Understandable." Alfred moved again, lowering his head enough to kiss Arthur on the cheek. "That's the best present I have for you, though. I'm sorry."

Arthur shook his head.

"You should be," he said. "It hardly matches up to mine."

He tilted his head and pushed upwards, pressing his mouth against Alfred's; Alfred closed his eyes and put his hands on Arthur's shoulders, feeling the coarse material of his filthy uniform beneath his fingers, his nails finding holes in the fabric, so different from the silks and velvets he had been regaled in during Christmases before when they shared another of their Christmas traditions, the customary drunken half-laughing kiss beneath the mistletoe somewhere close to midnight that sometimes led to something more, stumbling up the stairs clinging to each other (sort of like this but without the mud and barbed wire and far-off explosions).

Arthur tasted like rum, though – and smoke. That was another of his Christmas traditions and it was the tiniest shard of familiarity, of normalcy, that made the rest of this alright.

Arthur pulled back from him and Alfred smiled dazedly at him for a moment – and then sneezed. Arthur simply rolled his eyes at him as he sniffled miserably and cuddled close again.

"Merry bleeding Christmas, you wanker," Alfred heard him whisper.

Day One down! Poor sickly-starving-silly Alfred. Oh well, the Yanks were only in the war for like a year anyway. He'll be stuffing his face with turkey again soon enough (because although this wasn't dated, it can only have taken place in 1917).

Tomorrow is RoChu – but before we steer away from USUK, all USUK fans need to go to my profile and look at that link at the top that I'm very excited about.

I assure you that you won't regret it. XD

Until tomorrow!

RobinRocks

xXx

Baby, It's Cold Outside: The oft-covered song itself doesn't appear in any of these drabbles but it's a wartime song about the holiday season's notorious weather, written by Frank Loesser in 1944. I thought it was a fitting title... even if only one of these will be set during the "canon" timeline of WWII.

(It is freaking cold outside, though. The entirety of Britain is under like six feet of snow right now...)