Hey, I want to finish the next chapter of Born to be King and put it on here, but the chapter's stored on my computer at home and I'm not at home now, so I'm doing this so I can put something up while I'm here at this… ahem… crisis house :S

Yes, I'm a mess, so this story is sort of about Ludwig being a mess.

Anyway, I have recently gotten interested in Hetalia, and fallen in love with Roderich Edelstein, aka Austria, and I just HAD to put a fic out there about him, and I'm dipping my toes into new waters by crossing over with Hetalia…

Having noted the similarities between Roderich and Ludwig von Koopa (I even have a picture on my deviantART account that I drew of Ludwig looking like Roderich!) I decided to make it a crossover with the Mario/Koopalings canon, that takes place between a few of the chapters of Born to be King, so enjoy!

I do not own Hetalia or the characters of the Mario canon, and I certainly do not own any of the brands of candy and stuff that might be mentioned.

Sofia glared at her son. Ludwig was a mess, even worse than he had been during his Frankenstein University days. His hair matted and sticky with candy that his – AGAIN - less than an hour after she had carefully coiffed it to the bushy Beethoven-esque hairstyle that she liked it to be in. He smelled from not having bathed in the year that he had been at his father's. His eyes were bloodshot from all of the espresso he had been drinking, and his teeth were probably rotten from all of the candy he had been eating without a competent parent to monitor his sugar intake. She was about to find out, when she took him to the dentist that she now had no time to make him presentable for.

And sure enough, they were.

Ludwig cried, both at the pain and the indignity, as his four cavities were being drilled, insisting that they drug him with general anesthetic to make him completely unconscious. The dose wore off just in time for him to be conscious of the nightmarish root canal.

Ludwig left the dentist's office crying and begging for Mozartkugeln chocolate and a melange to wash it down with to comfort him, even though his taste buds were too numb from novocaine to taste it. He screamed out in want as his mother stopped at a red light by a McDonald's.

"Fast food? Your father has been feeding you FAST FOOD?"

"It's my guilty pleasure," the young Ludwig whimpered.

His mother ran the red light to get the burger joint out of the five-year-old's sight. "We are going home and we are eating Wienerschnitzelfor dinner."

Ludwig remembered how upset he had been when he discovered that the restaurant in Dark Land that was called Wienerschnitzel did not in fact serve the Viennese dish, or anything similar in even a remote, Americanized fashion. He rather looked forward to his favorite dish from home.

"Will there be Sachertorte?"

"After today's dental exam? NEIN!"

Ludwig ate his Schnitzelwith his hands while his mother reminded him to mind his manners, first softly, then sternly.

Ludwig bitterly sipped his unsweetened melange. Unsweetened caffeine is still caffeine, after all.

"I see that you are actually enjoying that decaffeinated espresso," Sofia remarked.

Ludwig spat it out. No wonder he still felt drowsy and terrible.

"So how's school?" his OnkelWolfgang asked. "Hear old King Koopa's putting you through the system, is that so?"

Ludwig drowsily hung his head.

"Well THAT'S the problem! Public education! He should be up at my alma mater earning a Ph. D. in Mad Science just like his good old Groβonkel!"

"It's a private school, actually," Ludwig said, noting inwardly that it made little difference.

"And it's an elementary school am I correct? That is simply…"

Wolfgang started screaming and convulsing.

"Onkel, are you all right?" Sofia asked.

"I'm fine, just another seizure, that's all. Anyway, Ludwig should be at graduate school right now! Tell me do they have any fine graduate schools in Dark Land?"

"Onkel,can't you see that Ludwig is not quite ready? Remember what a wreck he was when he came back from earning his Bachelor's?"

"So he gained the freshman fifteen, big deal."

"And he's gaining a Dark Land dozen on top of that!"

Ludwig blushed in shame as his mother sharply poked him in the gut.

"It can hardly be helped, considering my genetics," Ludwig retorted, poking his mother back in her own prodigious gut. "And we both have personal experience with how large my father is".

"Such attitude! And that is NOT necessarily true! Look, Onkelisn't fat!"

"I have always wondered about that," Ludwig mused, eyeing Wolfgang's bony figure with a flash of considerable envy.

"Tell me, Ludwig, what happened to the sweet cultured boy that I laid and hatched?"

"Ha, it just goes to show, you can't change what he's going to become!" said Wolfgang.

"A lowbrowed, boorish, ill-mannered despot like his father."

"NO! The espresso habit, the lack of sleep and hygiene, the intense craving for simple carbs that provide energy and theobromine that helps with his mood… he is a born scientist! He's taking after his good old great-uncle Wolfgang!"

Wolfgang patted Ludwig on the head. His hand got covered with dried, powdery chocolate residue that had been stuck in his hair for ages.

"Still, my young Boltzmann, you've got to bathe every ONCE in a while…"

"Mutter,Vater, would you please do me a favor and bathe him?" Sofia asked. "I have got some important decisions to make right now…"

Sofia's father Wilhelm banged on the table and shouted, "AND ALLOW THE BOY TO TAKE AWAY FROM MY VIOLIN TIME?"

Sofia apologized, remembering that her father was recovering from a stroke and had a hard enough time as it was learning how to play the violin one-handed.

Sofia's mother Josephine left the table and griped about how she never had any time to enjoy her old age and work on her research. She grabbed Ludwig by the hair and dragged him to the nearest bathroom.

"We need to put some culture back into his life," muttered Sofia. "That father of his is ruining him."

"Hey, you can't change what he is," said Wolfgang. "He did get half of his genes from the King, after all."

"But he's got the heart of an artist, can you not see that! He has an indelible passion for music and science, he brings a scientific sense of experimentalism, precision, and wonder to music, and an artistic flair to the sciences. He is literally LIGHTYEARS ahead of the entire world…"

"Us, even," admitted Wolfgang.

Sofia nodded in acknowledgement of her inadequacy. "And the stress of being put through school with those that are so far behind him, not to mention dealing with such an idiot for a father, is… overwhelming… and that's why he's behaving the way he is."

Sofia sighed. "I have a feeling that he is not being allowed to be what he wants to be, and this behavior of his is in a sort of rebellion… I am not trying to chage him… I am simply trying to peel back the layers of scum to expose the cultured pearl that lies inborn within!"

"Ha, to use that analogy, he was already becaming scum-coated while living with us! He spent more time going crazy in the lab with me than he did on your musical training!"

"And that's why I believe that, during this month that he has away from that so-called school his father has sentenced him to, he should spend his time in the most cultured house in the country, away from you."

"You don't mean…"

"The house of Austria. Roderich Edelstein himself."

"Haha, did you see what happened to Italy after he shoved culture down his throat? Italy used to be the cultural epicenter of Europe! Now, compared to Austria, it is filthy and poor, and Mr. Italy himself is a whiny loser who does nothing but flirt with the other countries, male and female, and obsess over pasta! PASTA! Suddenly I've got a craving for PASTA!"

Wolfgang was laughing like crazy.

"Wolfgang, calm down! Have you taken your medication today?"

"No, you took it away from me after I overdosed that one time, remember? HEEHEEHEEHEE!"

"Well, we don't serve pasta here. You know that. And tomorrow I will ask Mr. Austria if he will do us a favor and straighten this young country out. It might not have worked on Italy, but our son is different, and I believe that he will relish this opportunity. He will study music from this master, learn how to prepare the finest foods, be schooled in manners and how to groom himself, and pretty much spend his visit away from my parents."

Wilhelm dropped the violin whose head he had been trying to hold in his mostly paralyzed left fingers.

"Gott verdammte!"

Wolfgang laughed. "Hey, pops, perhaps you should switch to the cello!"

Josephine screamed and scolded Ludwig for biting her.

"Vater needs to recover, and Mutter, well, needs her alone time."

"But it's not often that Ludwig gets to visit us anymore! How much harm can one month do? I WANT TO SPEND TIME WITH MY GRAND NEPHEW!"

"Well he doesn't need that right now. He needs to be purified."

"Just for a week?"

"We'll see how it works out. You can visit if you behave yourself. Perhaps you should work on your music?"

"Sofia…"

"You're just as talented as the rest of the family."

"But Sofia... my parents FORCED me to play those instruments!"

Wolfgang ran, screaming, back to his lab.

"You get back here, you haven't had your medication!"