The Tinkering Trio (Hetalia)

Author: Ashynarr

Summary: Because you have more free time to build cool stuff when the rest of the world thinks you're airheads.

Disclaimer: Hetalia's not mine.

Warning: Ame Ita Pol friendship, repost, first posted July 4 2015

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"Feli, you sure this is the right place to put it?" Alfred asked, stepping back slightly to examine their project.

"Yeah, it shows so in the plans you and Feliks drew up, see?" The Italian replied, pushing the large wad of diagrams forward to point out the specific spot.

"Mmkay, just looks a bit weird having the exhaust so close to the intake on the engine," The American shook his head.

"Hey, I told you the math all works out!" The Polish Nation complained, hair tied back into a ponytail and cheek smeared with grease. "It gives the fuel more room to expand so you can reach higher energy densities when it goes back out."

"Hey, I wouldn't be building this if I didn't trust your math," Alfred grinned. "Just saying that it looks different from the ion engine designs my people have been working on for a while."

"They don't have the same natural gift for maths that I do," Feliks huffed. "Nor the time at hand to focus on it without having to worry about things like results or timelines or cost."

"Well sorry they're human and have lives outside of looking fabulous and complaining about Europe again."

"Aw, you think I'm fabulous?" The Polish man fluttered his eyes, laughing when the American lightly threw a wrench well away from where it stood a chance of hitting him, the force not even enough to dent the metal or the floor.

"Guys, is this part supposed to go here?" Feliciano interrupted, having been going over the engine designs again thanks to his innate sense of proportions and dimensions from a lifetime of dedicated art.

Feliks and Alfred both looked to the region in question, mouths twisting into frowns as they turned it around to look at it more closely.

"...shit, I think if that goes there, the heat from the pipe next to it will make it boil and explode."

"Fuck, I thought I accounted for that!" Feliks groaned, rubbing at his face while mumbling under his breath. "How far can we move the hydrogen pipe without having to redesign the entire engine shape?"

"Maybe two inches?" Alfred ran fingers over the area, trying to think of the changes mentally. "Can we move the wires on the other side to act as a buffer between them?"

"No no, that'll melt the metal in them and then there won't be any power getting through," Feliks bit his lip.

"What about down and to the side?" Feli asked after glancing at them again. "I think there's an open spot there."

They glanced down from the region on the papers up to the hologram of the engine they were designing thoughtfully, the product of a get together more than a decade previous. With a careful twist Alfred reached up and tugged the pipe entrance down slowly, maneuvering it until it was perched underneath the mass of wiring without touching and now far away from the heating pipes.

"...I think that'll do." Alfred decided after a bit. "Have to adjust the insides a bit to account, but I think we can keep going."

"I'll add that in in a minute, I'm trying to figure out if this'll affect the maximum thrust output," Feliks waved it off, right before all three jumped at someone knocking on the door. "Shit, I thought you said no one was coming by today!"

"Maybe it's just Tony checking in on us," The American offered, wiping his hands on his pants before heading over to the door. Cracking the door just enough to see who it was without showing anything of critical importance inside, he quickly threw up a wide grin to hide his surprise at his visitor. "Oh, hey Artiekins!"

Behind him, Feliks and Feliciano exchanged fast looks before saving and turning off the hologram, ducking underneath a nearby workbench that left them out of sight even with a fully open door.

"Must you call me that?" The English Nation sighed. "I've been trying to call you all morning to let you know I was in town early and to see if you wanted lunch, but you never answered."

"Is it lunch already?" Alfred wondered, realizing they might have lost track of time somewhere along the way. "Dang, I must've been really busy building my super fighting robot engine to fight aliens and clean up the garbage in the oceans and forgot!"

"Of course you were," Arthur replied dryly, not believing him at all. "Did you still want to get lunch?"

"Sure!" The American replied cheerfully, holding it a second before drooping. "Wait, I forgot I still have stuff I have to do for the boss, sorry, maybe tomorrow."

"Are you behind in your paperwork again? I honestly don't know how you ever managed to be a superpower with your lazy habits."

"Because I'm the hero, obviously!"

"Of course you are." Arthur exhaled slowly. "I'll leave you to your paperwork then; try to get it done before the meeting, if you could."

"Yeah yeah, I'll get right to it, no need to be all huffy." Alfred grinned and fistbumped the other's shoulder. "Catch up with you tomorrow then?"

"That sounds good," Arthur smiled lightly, stepping back and turning to go while shaking his head. "Seriously, robots…"

"Later Artie!" Alfred waved, waiting about ten seconds before slamming the door with a bit more force than needed, running a hand over his mouth after the grin dropped.

From under the table two voices burst out into hardly muffled giggles, drawing the annoyed glare of the superpower. "Hey, I'd like to see you guys come up with something ridiculous enough to keep him off our backs and get out of lunch plans with no warning whatsoever."

"Super fighting robot engine…" Feliks snerked as he crawled out from underneath, brushing his own clothes off. "I'm pretty sure this thing would explode any robot you tried to build around it."

"Hey, if it keeps the others from looking too close then it works, right? And a Gundam type ship would be pretty sick, but the amount of materials we'd need are crazy even by my standards." Alfred stuck out his tongue at the end in a fit of maturity.

As they bickered over the exact nature and power limits such a thing would require, Feliciano sat back with the folded-up plans and grinned. Arthur had been right about one thing - they'd completely missed lunch, and even his own job had given him quite the appetite. Eh, maybe he could make lunch and come back before they finished arguing over alloys; young Nations were so energetic sometimes!

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AN: Another older prompt I grabbed from the km ages ago, which basically asked for Al Feli and Feliks to be smarter than they acted around the others because, well, the others are really such drags and if their expectations are low they won't demand as much of them which leaves more free time for their hobbies. I might write more of this in the future, who knows.