Title: Let's Bring Back the Cold War (To Save on Air-Conditioning)
Character(s) or Pairing(s): Russia/America
Warnings: Adult language, use of human names, and domesticity.

Summary: Alfred is hot, and not in the good way. When all other methods fail, Ivan decides to help.

Author's Notes: Four more fics to go before I've completely updated my account. *Pumps fists* Just a random insomnia-induced drabble that I was finally able to finish after my computer stopped holding my Word documents hostage. I've read so many fictions where Ivan is described as being cold. Like literally, his body produces no heat. And I'm not making fun of this theory, or the writers who write it, but this didn't stop my mind from thinking: "Wouldn't it be awesome for Alfred to have that around on a really hot day..." and I decided to play with it. That and I wanted to give Ivan a situation where he could help somebody without ending up hurting them instead.

Disclaimer: I don't own Axis Powers Hetalia.

Saying it was hot that day was an understatement.

Saying it was so fucking hot that it felt like the sun had rented the apartment above him and cranked the thermostat as high as it could go was a little more accurate.

Every single air molecule was bloated with a hundred degrees too much heat, expanding and coalescing like a bag of gummy bears kicked underneath the backseat of an old car. So one giant amorphous glob is formed—that was what he felt on his skin. It went inside his pores, making him feel sticky from the inside out, and way too solid.

He blew out a gust of air in irritation. Heroes shouldn't have to sweat. It didn't look or feel awesome to have it creeping like insects or Francis's fingers probing in places he didn't even know he had glands…

Water didn't help, either. He waited for the semi-cool water to fill the dish of his hands, stooping over the sink once it did in order to splash it onto his face. It turned tepid by the time it dribbled down his neck into the collar of his T-shirt, which clung to him in the most awkward of places no matter how many times he tugged.

When Alfred finally realized there was a solution in taking his shirt off and tossing it aside, he blamed it on the heat as opposed to one of many blonde moments in his lifetime.

…Not that it did much good, anyway. He got four, maybe five seconds of relief before heat wrapped around his skin again like tight cellophane. It caused him to bang his forehead into the mirror for contact with the cool surface, where his vision went from blurry to clear and cross-eyed. Then back to myopic when he drew backwards again. Blinking back the pinpricks of sweat stinging his pupils.

Alfred left his glasses on the edge of the sink as he dragged himself out of the bathroom and didn't stop until his knees hit the edge of the bed. There he considered his mattress with a type of half-lidded focus, as if contemplating the coolest entry point. He finally rolled into bed like a tranquilized wildebeest, letting his arms and legs fold to the side when his head hit the pillow—and his ass bumped into the thigh of another person.

"Oh, Alfred, have you cooled off now?" Ivan said with as much interest as if he asked whether or not he ate lunch, or cleaned his toilet lately.

Alfred squinted. "Was that a joke?"

"Does it sound like one?"

"No. Not a funny one, anyway." He wriggled. "…Fuck, it's just too hot."

"I had not noticed."

"Because you're a freak, Ivan." The words hung in the air as a fragmented insult, which Ivan didn't react to, and Alfred hesitated to continue as he shifted around to get comfortable. "How are you not burning up? I'm sweating like a pig's nut sack over here. And you were wearing that giant fucking flasher coat before…"

Before he made him take it off because the sight of layers made Alfred's stomach twist like a towel in the hands of a teenage jock, ready to whip one of his teammates (heterosexually, of course). And it was a struggle of wills to get him to take the damn thing off.

Nothing that a hero couldn't handle, though. And his plan—like anything spawned from a hero's mind—was foolproof. All he had to do was convince Ivan they were going to have sex. That got Ivan to let him touch his buttons, and he was going to take off his shirt, anyway…

The only problem with his awesome plan was his escape, when he snatched the coat and Ivan made a face terrifyingly close to that of a little boy who was just denied a Happy Meal. So different and atypical from the normal Ivan Braginsky that he was shocked into dropping it (that and the material made his palms sweat).

The coat was now slung over a chair, and Ivan's eyes seemed to assess it from afar before he smiled. "Mm, actually I find it pleasant. But if you say so, Alfred."

He then opened his book back to the page he held onto with his thumb and resumed reading, not saying another word. And after a few beats of unbearable suffering alone, Alfred tugged childishly at the hem of his shirt. "Let's go. This is stupid."

"Where would you like to go?"

"I don't know. Anywhere that's cold—where there's a working air conditioner," he added, glaring in the direction of his thermostat as if it could understand his resentment. "Let's go to your house."

"Do you think there will be snow at my house?"

"Yeah, because there is. Isn't there?"

Ivan's lips turned up. "…I have summer too, you know. It is not always snowing at my house."

Alfred blinked. "Seriously?"

Ivan's smile became strained, but he nodded all the same.

"Awesome. I always thought, y'know, whenever I think of Russia I think of—"

"Snow, bears and people wearing big furry hats, yes?"

Alfred hummed, but the sound broke off into more of a frustrated groan, slapping a hand on the back of his neck and palming the sweat off. He almost reached for Ivan's scarf to wipe it off, but had an uncharacteristic flash of foresight and wiped it off on his shorts, instead.

"Do you still have that vacation ticket I got for you?"

"The what-now?"

"The ticket to Siberia." Alfred continued to stare at him vacantly. "The one I got for your birthday."

"…I remember you gave me condoms…"

"After the condoms, Alfred."

He squinted, scratching his hairline in thought. "Err…there was that really sharp tissue I used to blow my nose…if that wasn't it, I might've thrown it out, or used it as a bookmark, or a doorstop…something…"

If Alfred had been paying attention or had his glasses on, he might've noticed the flash across Ivan's face, like a strand of lightning in the clouds. A dark, concentrated presence in the room that was slowly making the plant next to Alfred's window die (he thought it was just the heat). But then it vanished, and another sunny expression took its place.

"My, that is unfortunate. The Arctic Ocean is very cold." His eyes crinkled behind his smile. "You are strong, Alfred, I wonder how long you could hold your breath as I force your head underwater…"

Alfred flopped against the pillow. "Thanks for trying. But I think I'm just going to dunk my head under the faucet again. Maybe I'll manage to knock myself—"

He did not see Ivan mark his page or put his book down. He did not even feel the shift in the mattress as he tried to sit up but was forced back down again by Ivan, who rolled on top of him without warning or invitation.

Alfred let out a gust of breath, pushing at his shoulders. "The fuck are you doing?"

"Helping~" Ivan laughed in a singsong.

"Bullshit, you're crushing me." Alfred wheezed. "I can't feel my spleen. Get off!"

Ivan continued giggling, not showing any sign of listening, pressing their foreheads together.

"Do you feel colder yet?"

Alfred didn't understand or care what he meant at first; because he was too busy trying to push Ivan off, which was like a kitten trying to crawl out from underneath a manatee. And his nose was in the way. It kept digging into his face and he kept shifting around trying to angle their faces without accidentally kissing Ivan, which he was too pissed off to deal with right now. He was already being smothered by the other's body weight, stuck between a rock and a former Communist country, as some would say. The thought of sucking face on top of all that almost gave him heatstroke.

But when he decided to push Ivan's face out of the way instead of moving himself (it was Ivan who started it, after all), his fingertips caught a very different sensation. He was so surprised it took him a few seconds to realize the change in temperature came from Ivan.

When he shoved again, it was a little bit easier to flip Ivan over and scramble on top of him, pressing his cheek against his shoulder. It was the sensation of snow angels, ice skating and breath-freshening gum all at once. A cool breeze seemed to be circulating under Ivan's skin instead of blood, escaping through his pores, melting upwards into his belly.

"Alfred?"

"Hnn—?"

"You never answered my question."

Alfred hummed, adjusting his arms and legs to fit the shape of the body beneath him. Only then could he think about responding: "It's like hugging a refrigerator…"

Ivan bobbed upwards to reach for his book (Alfred grunting in protest, and Ivan chuckled), propping the bind against Alfred's head with a hollow-sounding thud. That seemed to either amuse him, or strike his curiosity, because he thwacked him harder just for the sake of hearing it again.

By then Alfred was too sedated to react with even a finger. Maybe it wasn't Ivan's lack of body heat that made him sleepy, because something about that just didn't fall together correctly. Then again, neither did the concept of anything about Ivan being soothing, and this moment of peace between them.

Maybe it was the sound of the heartbeat underneath his ear that he listened to like a seashell on the beach. Or the aged paper-scent of Ivan's book he kept breathing in. It blended inexplicably with the smells of wool, snow and earth. And it somehow overpowered the presence of the city in his senses: the perspiring, sun burnt asphalt and the exhaust from cars packed together. Alfred shut his eyes, and he wasn't in New York City, anymore. He was wedged somewhere where his thoughts blended together, and he wondered if he dribbled water on Ivan, would they freeze together.

When he woke up again, there was a slight damp spot where his mouth was, and he couldn't see Ivan's expression. His paperback was splayed over his nose, as if Dr. Zhivago was trying to eat his face, but he half-assumed he was sleeping.

He sighed and turned his head in the opposite direction, consciously avoiding the place where he drooled to look out the window towards the sound of traffic and invasive orange light filtering into the room. Not quite red or gold.

Before he disturbed Ivan from his nap, and found he could walk around his apartment again without enjoying the sensation of being cooked, he got to thinking: maybe a vacation to Siberia wouldn't be so bad.