Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Waltz: a dance in triple time performed by a couple who as a pair turn rhythmically around and around as they progress around the dance floor.

"Kyoya."

Hibari Kyoya looked up at his father, shoving too-long hair out of his eyes. He would need to get a haircut soon. This was no good for training. And he needed training.

Even at only two years old, he wanted to be strong, like Okaa-san, like Otou-san.

"Otou-san?" Was it time? He had waited for so long with that strange not-baby in red clothes for his parents to return from the hospital. Kyoya knew the not-baby, always smiling and calm, was strong, but he liked the monkey better, and his parents the best.

"Come," Hibari Satoshi said simply, turning on his heel. His steps were sure and silent on the tatami mats. Kyoya followed his father to the new room that they had prepared in the last month. He had, with Otou-san's help, painted the fusuma panels himself: first with a creamy color like milk and then on bamboo top of that in bright green. 

He had gotten a lot of the paint on his clothes and on the floor but that was okay. Even Okaa-san hadn't been mad, and she usually didn’t like it when Kyoya got dirty. 

As he stepped into the nursery, he found his mother sitting seiza on a zabuton, back straight and a bundle of white cloth in her arms. Hibari Rika was missing the swelled stomach she'd had for a while now, her white yukata flowing smoothly onto the floor.

"Come meet your baby sister, Kyoya," she said without looking up. Okaa-san smiled as Otou-san came to stand by her, body curved protectively over this new thing.

Kyoya crossed the room on careful feet, feeling oddly expectant. Kneeling next to his mother, he looked down. A squished, chubby, absurdly small face greeted him back, fast asleep. Was this it, his newborn younger sibling? Her nose was so small.

"She looks weak," he said with a frown, almost afraid to touch her. It was as if she would break with a poke, like that vase that had been in the hallway before Kyoya had accidentally smashed it. Had he ever been this frail? He didn't think so.

"She will grow," Otou-san replied. "Your sister is but a few days old at the moment."

"What's her name?" Kyoya asked, watching the gentle rise and fall of her chest, the evidence that she was alive, this small life that was now his to watch over. His parents hadn’t said anything like that to him but he was a smart boy.

He knew it was the duty of the strong to protect the weak, the duty of the older to protect the younger.

"Masami," Okaa-san proclaimed as the baby yawned widely and peeled open her eyelids so steel gray eyes, fuzzy with sleep, could blink up at them with interest. "The newest member of the Hibari Clan."

His new sister, Kyoya learned as the months flew past in a blur of tears and diapers, was a relatively quiet baby compared to the few playmates that his mother occasionally brought to the house. They were annoying, screaming at the slightest problem. It made his head hurt.

Masami didn't cry much. She liked to observe the world around her curiously, batting at the toys that his parents gave her and fussing with the puzzles that were meant to make her smarter, cooing delightedly at him or his parents when they appeared.

But that didn't mean that she wasn't a normal baby with normal baby problems.

Kyoya winced and was thrown to the floor as a wail echoed throughout the house, loud and shrill. He still wasn’t used to the noise that randomly tried to kill his ears every so often but he would have to learn. To be strong.

"Enough," Otou-san said, walking out of the dojo. Okaa-san had left to get the food, leaving them behind to keep an eye on the baby who was supposed to be asleep.

Kyoya gritted his teeth and got back on his feet, hurrying after his father to the nursery room.

"Prepare some milk," Otou-san ordered, Masami already in his arms. She usually woke up hungry so that was probably why she was crying. Which made sense, Kyoya didn't like to be hungry either. Thankfully, her cries had already slowed down to sad sniffling. Her tiny hands waved in the air, making shaky grabbing motions.

Kyoya nodded and headed off to the kitchen where he quickly prepared the milk formula as Okaa-san had taught him not long ago. He didn't know why she wasn't eating meat and green things like he had to, but Okaa-san and Otou-san had said she needed milk right now. Shaking the bottle, he handed it back to Otou-san and frowned at his sister, not that she was in any position to care.

Otou-san nodded in thanks and held it up to Masami, who latched onto the nipple immediately and began sucking loudly. "You must refine your concentration. Loud noises cannot knock you off balance."

"Hai, Otou-san." Kyoya frowned harder. He still wasn't quite sold on this new addition to the family. "When is she going to talk?" So far, all Masami had vocalized were baby talk and odd babbling. Not at all suitable for his little sister.

"Whenever she so wishes," Otou-san said. "Masami is only five months old. Be patient, Kyoya. Patience will do you well in life."

Kyoya wasn't so certain but nodded anyway. He would try.

"Happy Birthday, Masami," Kyoya said seriously to the girl he held in his arms. She was strong enough now that he could carry her instead of holding her, hands clinging weakly to his shirt.

Masami giggled, smiling toothily in response. She had started teething not long ago, and while she was behaving for now, he hadn't been happy at all when she had started chewing on his stuffed animals, and occasionally, Kyoya himself.

She had even bitten him once! Kyoya had sulked in the dojo for an entire hour before Okaa-san came to fetch him.

Now officially a year old on the second of April, she still hadn't said a proper word but their parents still weren't concerned, even though Kyoya was a little disappointed. He had overheard Okaa-san and Otou-san "betting" with each other on who Masami would call for first, not that he really knew what that meant. Otou-san had just said that it was something he would understand when he was older.

"This way, Kyoya," Okaa-san told him with a small smile, gracefully leading her children to the chabudai covered in red cloth. Taking Masami from his arms, she placed her in the center of the table and stepped back. "It's important that we do this correctly. It's a tradition that our cousins from China passed onto the Clan, and it'll be a strong indicator of your sister's future."

"You received your first pair of tonfa when you did this not so long ago," Otou-san added.

Oh. That was important. Kyoya nodded. It would be up to Masami to make her choice then.

Kyoya watched silently with his parents as his sister glanced around at the splay of various items before her, tiny brow furrowed in confusion. The weapons probably just looked like big, shiny things to her. She babbled baby nonsense and began to crawl around on the cloth, balance still a little unsteady. She could stand now but couldn't walk yet. Moving past a broadsword and a revolver, she giggled and wrapped her fingers around — 

"A gunsen," Kyoya identified as Masami played with the Japanese war fan with delight, instinctively avoiding the sharp edges. Not a bad choice, he thought, if a little too flimsy for him.

Watching Kyoya guide Masami back to her room with an adorably approving look on his little face, Rika smiled, eminently satisfied. "Excellent." An assassin commonly disguised as a courtesan, she had recognized from the start that her son was not suited to her talents, but that of her husband's. But her daughter...her daughter showed true promise.

At her side, Satoshi smirked faintly and shook his head. As a man of the law, he supposed he should stop his wife from creating another holy terror like herself. At least Kyoya would use his powers for good...mostly.

But as a husband...

"Do try and keep her humble," he advised.

"Now, would I not?" she sniffed.

"Certainly."

"Oniiii — ?"

Kyoya paused his katas and looked up to find Masami sitting on the floor, blinking at him with wide eyes, a pout on her lips. The uchiwa she had been playing with as a precursor to her gunsen was now a crumpled mess on the floor. Another toy doomed to the trash then.

Okaa-san and Otou-san probably weren't going to like this, but Kyoya just felt smug. While their parents made certain that one of them was around at all times in case of emergencies, they were also nearly always busy with "work", leaving it to Kyoya to look after Masami most of the time.

Naturally, his title would be the first word she ever spoke. They had both gotten that "bet" wrong!

"Onii-san," Kyoya corrected with a satisfied smile, walking forward to see what she wanted. She beamed at him and raised her arms in the universal gesture to be held. Ugh, fine. He lifted her up and frowned, trying to be as stern as their father. "You're going to be spoiled," he scolded, booping her gently on the nose. He had already learned the hard way that pressing too hard just led to lots of crying.

Masami giggled and clapped her small hands. "Onii-san! Onii-san!" she cheered, waving her fists in the air.

Kyoya sighed again — there was no use explaining anything to her like this — and then froze as a chilling aura appeared in the doorway, Okaa-san's voice soft in a way that said he was in trouble. "What was that, Kyoya?"

Oh no. He hesitated for a split second before squaring his shoulders and turning to meet his doom. Well...at least this meant that his sister liked him best?

Masami sniffed and tiptoed into her big brother's room, rubbing at her eyes. "Onii-san?"

Onii-san opened his eyes very quickly even though she was sure he had been fast asleep when she first came in, instantly finding her in the gloom of his room. "Masami," he said quietly, sitting up in his futon. "What's wrong?"

"'m scared," she whispered, bottom lip wobbling and tears in her eyes. She swallowed hard and did her very best not to let the tears fall. Crying, she knew although no one had told her, was Bad and Weak and Not Hibari-like.

Onii-san clearly thought about that for a moment. He had probably never been scared in his life. "Why?"

"Had a n-nightmare," Masami confided, looking at the ground. She knew it was silly of her to be scared by a nightmare now that she wasn't a baby anymore. She was already three! She should be strong and brave, not scared by fake things like dreams.

Onii-san grunted and shifted over. "What was it about?" he asked while she slipped into his futon beside him, burrowing under the warm kakefuton.

"I-I was being tied up," she said, cuddling close. "A-And I co-couldn't move and then they were lighting me on fire, and - and — "

(Kyoya barely restrained a long-suffering sigh. He would have to inform their mother in the morning that her horror stories of witches being burned at the stake in the European Dark Ages were not good for his sister's state of mind, no matter how inspirational they were meant to be.)

"Hn. Herbivores are not frightening, Masami."

"Herbivores?"

"Weak, crowding creatures. Otou-san can explain it better," he told her. "Tell your nightmare herbivores that I'll bite them all to death."

Masami was startled into a giggle. "W-Will that work?"

"Of course."

And just like he said, she didn't have any nightmares that night with her older brother curled up around her.

"Leaving?" A four-year-old Masami peered up at Kyoya with big, sad eyes. "Onii-san's leaving?"

"Only for a little while," Kyoya promised, practice tonfa already securely hidden away in his bag. Okaa-san and Otou-san had made sure he knew how to take care of himself, and Masami was already making good progress on her own training. Theirs was a Clan built on strength, and even their youngest would know how to properly protect herself.

"Where?" She had to hurry to keep up with his longer legs, her too-long kimono dragging on the ground behind her. Kyoya refused to wear anything that got in his way more than a yukata at home, so Okaa-san had been playing dress-up with Masami instead. He would feel a little bad about it but for some reason, Masami liked all the fancy clothes and accessories.

"School." Kyoya's eye was already twitching at the thought of crowding loud, weak herbivores. He went out with their parents sometimes, and the utter lack of order beyond their house was awful. Who was taking care of all these sheep and why weren't they doing their jobs correctly? So unruly. "Namimori Elementary School."

"Oh." Masami smiled, latching tightly onto his left leg at the door. "Good luck, Onii-san!"

"Hn." Kyoya spared a pat on the head and a boop to the nose for his baby sister. When she let go, he scowled and went off to school for the first time.

After Onii-san left, Masami spent the day like usual, even if she was a bit more distracted than she should be. There were etiquette lessons at breakfast, and then fan training, hand-to-hand combat, calligraphy, reading time...

"Stand up straight!" Okaa-san snapped, looking at her up and down. "Chin up, shoulders back, and alert, Masami! Eyes on me!"

"Hai, Okaa-san," she said obediently, trying not to let the heavy books stacked up on her head fall. Balancing, Okaa-san had said, was important for training and one of the first things she needed to master.

Then, there was tai chi, flower arranging, anatomy, tea ceremony, snack time, meditation...

The front door slammed open with a bang that echoed through the house. Oh! Onii-san was home! Eyes flying wide open, Masami made puppy-dog eyes at her mother, who sighed and gestured for her to go. Beaming, she dashed to the genkan and flung herself at Kyoya. "Onii-san! Okaeri!"

Gentle hands caught her automatically. "Masami. Tadaima." The dark frown on Kyoya's face lightened a little.

"Welcome back, Kyoya," Okaa-san greeted, coming up behind them at a much slower pace. "Masami, what have I told you? Glide, don't stomp. And what's the proper way to greet your brother?"

Masami heaved a heavy sigh and pulled back from Kyoya to perform an elaborate bow awkwardly. "Greetings, Onii-san," she chanted dutifully.

The corners of Kyoya's mouth tilting subtly in a smirk, he relented enough to give a small nod to his long-suffering sister.

"Good, now don't make me say it again," Okaa-san said sternly before turning to her son. "Kyoya, I'm going to go grocery shopping. Watch your sister."

"Hai, Okaa-san."

"So?" Masami dropped the formality as soon as Okaa-san was gone and fluttered around Kyoya curiously. She didn't usually leave the house so the Outside was a mystery to her. "How was school, Onii-san?"

"Terrible," he said bluntly, stalking into the kitchen and falling into a chair. "Masami, tea."

"Hai, Onii-san!" Setting up water to boil, she prepared the teapot with confidence. Practice made perfect, after all, and Okaa-san made her practice twice daily. "What was wrong?"

"The herbivores," Kyoya growled, eyebrows coming together, "were even worse than I expected. Nonstop chattering and crowding, no understanding of their position in the world, and no respect for the peace of the school! They're stupid beyond what I thought was possible."

Masami hummed to herself, trying to think of a way to fix things like Okaa-san always said she should instead of making pointless excuses. "What about the teachers?" she asked, scrambling onto the chair next to her brother's. "Aren't they supposed to enforce the school rules?"

Kyoya scoffed, looking at her sideways in a way that meant she'd said something very stupid. "Just as pathetic. They do nothing."

"Hmm, well then," she said, leaping down to pour the hot water into the teapot, "why don't you do something about it, Onii-san? You're really strong." Really, really strong. Masami never lasted for more than two minutes when they sparred and that was when he was going easy on her.

But that was okay. Okaa-san said she'd improve if she kept training, so Masami always did her best when it came to training time. She didn't want Onii-san to leave her behind!

Kyoya was silent while they waited for the tea to steep, but the smirk that stretched over his face at last could have chilled the bravest of men. "You're right. I do believe that is exactly what I'll do." The manner in which he fingered his tonfa made his intentions clear.

Masami mimicked their mother's serene smile and poured the tea. Not a drop spilled — perfect!

With some help from their father, Kyoya set up a patrol around Namimori Elementary School, biting to death any and all wrongdoers that he caught with his tonfa. It was very efficient and effective, to the collective horror of the teachers, parents, and students.

Mostly the students to be honest.

Masami was content to stay at home, practicing with her fan and learning what her parents wanted to teach her. If Onii-san said that the Outside was so awful, she didn't want to go out either.

Traditionally, tessenjutsu was defensive in nature, with lots of joint-locking and choking techniques possible. When closed, the fan could be used to strike at pressure points (which she was learning in anatomy!), or to block and shield. The ribs were sharpen, so she could also stab or jab if she wanted to. When open, the fan could be used to confuse her enemies and slash with the fan's sharp edge.

Okaa-san, being awesome and scary, went ten steps beyond that and crafted super sharp iron foils with a coating of "white palladium" on her fan, which meant she could do even more moves if she wanted to!

Of course, Masami was taught every style of combat possible for fans. A Hibari never did anything halfway, much less the security and protection of one of their own. She was also warned to be very careful to not slice her own throat with her own fan. That would be the height of herbivore behavior.

On the side, there were also lessons in aikido, dancing, poisons and antidotes, shogi, kimono styles, shamisen, go...

Okaa-san knew a lot.

Of all her lessons, Masami loved to dance the most. Sometimes, when her mother was busy with something or another, she would creep into the dojo and dance with her fan to the drum of her heart. It was like flying, she thought, the purest freedom. When Okaa-san caught her once, she just nodded and said this would be good for her balance and mobility and that no Hibari would bow to herbivorous foolishness. Whatever that meant. Then she was taught dance styles until her head hurt and her muscles ached.

Otou-san liked to teach about things like honor, rules, and integrity. He taught Masami about the dreaded Outside: politics and governing, math, science, diplomacy, and history. He also occasionally mentioned secret things like "The Triads" that should be kept within the Clan, which Masami solemnly promised to do.

Otou-san was also the one who sat her down one day and explained the true law of the world, as he had once done with Onii-san. "There are three basic types of people in the world, Masami. First, there are the herbivores, who crowd together to protect themselves and follow wherever the crowd leads. Think of sheep and deer. Not very strong but many in number. The world is filled with herbivores. You may avoid them, as your brother does, or use them to your advantage, as your mother does."

"Like Onii-san's classmates?" Despite his new patrols, Kyoya would still sometimes mutter in disgust when he came back home about the herbivores he was forced to associate with. Masami normally just listened and nodded like she understood.

"That's right. Then, there are the carnivores, like our Clan. We are the strong who will inherit the world, the ones who corral the herbivores when necessary. We protect our Territory and do not hesitate to fight for what is ours. We do not obey authority blindly and lose ourselves to sheep-mentality like the herbivores do. As with any apex predator, carnivores are small in number but formidable even on their own. Be careful when meeting a fellow carnivore not of our Clan; carnivores do not take well to so-called 'sharing'."

"What about the third type?"

"The omnivores. They are both herbivores and carnivores. A...rare breed, I suppose. Capable of herbivore behavior and carnivore strength, omnivores tend to stay as herbivores until the situation is dire and then rise to the challenge as a carnivore. They use camouflage to hide in plain sight and rarely show their fangs unless forced to. In my experience, they can be intriguing people but not much of a threat unless severely provoked."

"But we're the carnivores?"

"Yes. Don't ever forget that. The Hibari Clan bows to no one, and we aren't afraid to prove it."

Onii-san was at school during the day, but when he came home, Okaa-san or Otou-san would go out, sometimes to buy food and sometimes to do other stuff (aka Rika killed and Satoshi investigated said kills). That was fine for both Kyoya and Masami. They were independent children, probably the most independent children in Namimori. They sparred most of the time — Kyoya always won — and then Kyoya did his homework while Masami fiddled with her small projects. Eventually, they made dinner or ate leftovers and then it was bedtime.

They weren't much bothered by the long stretches of silence so everything worked out. The quiet was nice.

A year passed. And then two.

Masami turned five. She went to school.

"Greetings. My name is Hibari Masami. Please be good to me." She bowed and sat back down with her best sweet smile. That smile was a lie, but Okaa-san had been very clear on this. First impressions were important...though by the whispers already drifting through the small classroom, there was no need.

Onii-san had made a big impact during his two years.

"Hibari? Isn't that...!"

"That really scary guy my brother told me about!"

"I heard he attacks anyone who doesn't follow the rules!"

"Are they really related?"

Masami pursed her lips a little but said nothing as the next student was called to introduce himself. So far, she hadn't been impressed with her elementary school. Or, to be more exact, her classmates were rather...dull. But she guessed she should give them a chance or two. Otou-san said that sometimes people surprised you.

Despite that thought, Masami still spent most of class time staring out the window. She wondered what was out there, beyond the horizon.

When recess came around at last, Yumiko-sensei breathed a sigh of relief. The first week of the year was always the worst. Stepping out to supervise the children, she observed happily that most of the kids had befriended one or two others and were now playing without a care in the world. Some of the boys had even started a game of soccer.

...maybe not soccer, she corrected herself when one of the boys — Kusaka Kozue, if she recalled correctly — picked up the ball and threw it, but some kind of game. As long as everyone was happy and getting along, that was all she cared about.

Sweeping her gaze across the field, she suddenly noticed a girl leaning against the fence all by herself. Frowning in concern, for no child should ever be left to play alone, Yumiko made her way over to the forlorn student and was promptly pinned to the spot by sharp eyes. Despite herself, Yumiko froze, her mind catching up at long last as she took in who the girl was. Long ebony hair pinned up by old-fashioned flower kanzashi, pale skin, flawlessly pressed student uniform.

Hibari Masami.

Yumiko knew of Hibari Kyoya, of course. Everyone did. She didn't entirely approve of his disciplinary methods — by Kami-sama, she had seen him beat someone bloody! — but she did have to admit that the school had certainly calmed down since he came along. There were fewer fights in the hallways and the students were always on time for class now. And as a result, the students were learning more! So, she was predisposed to like Masami with her perfect manners and adorable smile, even though she understood everyone else's reservations regarding the girl completely. Was that why she was alone?

"Yumiko-sensei," Masami greeted with a graceful bow that Yumiko found herself ridiculously jealous of. She herself would probably trip and fall head first, and she was more than twenty years older! "Is there something the matter?"

Shaking off her musings, Yumiko knelt down to the girl's level with a warm smile. "No, no, Masami-chan. I was just wondering: why aren't you playing with everyone else?"

Masami straightened up, looking unusually thoughtful for her age. Looking around the playground, she reached into her pocket and retrieved a thin object, snapping it open to reveal a lovely black fan with silver engravings that gleamed in the sunlight. Taken aback as the girl began to fan herself lightly, Yumiko couldn't help but question what sort of people the child's parents were to invoke such odd behavior in a five-year-old. Maybe they were rich? Perhaps she was imitating her mother? It would explain Kyoya.

Somewhat. Maybe. No, not really...

"I'm afraid I don't really like the games my classmates prefer," Masami said finally, smiling cutely. "May I go inside and read a picture book?"

Yumiko concealed a frown. Kids should be socializing with each other at this age but...a bookworm then? It wouldn't be the first time she'd heard the request from some of the more introverted students. "Alright," she allowed. "Come with me."

(As Masami followed the teacher back into the classroom, her gunsen hidden away in plain sight, she happened to notice the boy at the edge of the playground with spiky brown hair was being bullied.

She narrowed her eyes and made a note to investigate later.)

"Well?" Okaa-san crossed her arms, eyes steady on her youngest when the two returned home. It had been two weeks since school started. "How was school today?"

"Boring," Masami proclaimed with a pout. "I already know all the stuff they teach us." Although at least the teachers had had the decency to introduce origami today. She had made a little purple wolf.

"I told you it was filled with herbivores," Kyoya reminded her, slipping off his shoes. "They're dull."

"I know," she sighed, wandering off to the kitchen to prepare their customary tea, "but I still expected more."

Okaa-san nodded with a contemplative hum and left, probably to go talk to Otou-san.

"Neh, Onii-san, can I see the school registry?" Masami asked after they finished their first cup of tea. The Hibari Clan tended towards traditionalism, but they weren't Stupid. For all that their home was typically old-fashioned, they did have the latest computers available. Personally, she liked books better, and her brother didn't bother with computers at all, but they had both been taught how to use technology to their advantage.

Kyoya flicked a telling look at her. "Why?"

"Curious," she said with an innocent smile.

The slight quirk of his eyebrow said quite plainly that her brother wasn't fooled at all, but Kyoya let it pass, getting up and logging into the school website. "Your class?"

"Yes, please." Clearing the table, Masami began preparations for dinner. While her brother could and did cook, she was better at it, so long as he kept a close eye on her when it came to the stove.

"Here." Kyoya turned the screen in her direction, getting up to start chopping the carrots.

Drying her hands on a towel, Masami jumped off the stall that she used to reach the counter and searched the pictures displayed. It was easy to find the boy with his silly fluffy hair.

Sawada Tsunayoshi.

Hmm. Masami retrieved her fan and flipped it between her fingers, thinking. She would let it go for now, she decided. It was only the second week, so he'd probably get back up on his feet in a month or so. Besides, she didn't want to get involved in other people's problems unless she had to.

"Done?" Kyoya asked blandly, the carrots now in thirty neat little slices and the onions next to go on the execution board.

"Almost!" Masami quickly scanned the page, memorizing pictures to names. Personal impressions were important too. Clicking on the exit button once she was done, she shut down the computer and concentrated on making chicken stew. Maybe hamburger steak tomorrow? It was Onii-san's favorite.

Ooh, and maybe some dango the day after? That was Masami's favorite.

With how well-known Kyoya was, there would have been trouble sooner or later. Her brother had warned her himself, so Masami was actually a little surprised when the first incident came more than two months later. She had thought they would have realized much sooner. Really, it wasn't as if there wasn't family resemblance.

"Hmph. So this is that brute's little sister?" The boy, two or three years older than her and a victim of her brother's tonfa no doubt, sneered down at her, a blue bruise vivid on his cheek.

His friend cracked his knuckles, smirking. "You should tell your brother not to mess around, little girl. Who cares about littering?! It was just one stupid cup!"

"Don't worry, we'll make this quick," the third student sneered, closing in on Masami from the right while the first and second boxed her in from the front and the left. "When we're done with you, your beast of a brother will know better than to bother anyone ever again!"

Masami merely eyed the three idiots and sighed, closing her book. It was recess, and she, as usual, had asked to go inside to read. Yumiko-sensei was outside, looking after the others, leaving her alone. Pity that she wasn't the easy prey that the older students expected. She could last up to ten minutes against Onii-san by now.

"Please cease and desist at once," Masami requested softly, retrieving her fan and snapping it open to fan herself. "I would rather not dance today." They would be unpleasant partners anyway.

"Hah, what does that even mean!?" the second student spit out, face twisting up. Clearly, he had not gone through Hibari Rika's School of Perfect Poise or Else. "What, going to call for big brother to come to the rescue? Dance? Who's dancing here?!" The other two joined him in laughing, the ugly sound echoing in the empty classroom.

Masami could only sigh again and shake her head. She had tried. She put her book down and glanced around, pointedly memorizing the faces of the three boys. Should it be necessary, she would be able to look them up in the school registry later.

"Take this, you stupid brat!" The first boy yelled, pulling back a fist. Slow. His stance was all wrong, too, full of holes. He would break his thumb that way.

Masami had lived her entire life up until now measuring herself against only family members. Outside that carefully crafted world, it was almost shocking how...weak this boy was. A hopeless herbivore, as Onii-san would say. With a small huff, she leaped up from her seat in a fluid movement, closing her fan to hide the sharp edges.

There was no need to actually hurt these herbivores. They didn’t know better, that was all. 

Whacking the first student in the neck with her gunsen, she was already moving before the other two could register the blow. The boy from the left had rushed forward and barely managed to widen his eyes before she landed a blow to his stomach and then followed up with another to the back of his head. She hit just enough to incapacitate, not enough to kill any brain cells, if he even had any in the first place.

"You-You b-bitch!" The last one howled as his friends slumped to the floor, charging head-on at Masami. No finesse whatsoever. Suppressing her eye-roll — not proper, Okaa-san had said over and over — she turned to the side, the punch rustling a few strands of her hair as it passed, and struck the boy right in the solar plexus.

He fell, and she straightened up, the sudden skirmish surprisingly short. Barely a few seconds had passed from beginning to end.

Well. That was that. Masami gracefully stepped over the fallen students and spread her fan open to hide the bottom half of her face. To maintain an air of mystery, Okaa-san had said, although she didn’t quite understand what that meant yet.

Judging by what she knew of Onii-san's patrols...

The door swung open to crash harshly into the wall with a jarring bang. Her brother stood in the doorway, tonfa in hand. A single glance of the room gave him the essentials of what had happened, and Onii-san raised an eyebrow at Masami.

She only smiled brightly, removing her fan from her face to greet her brother with a flourish of black silk and a bow. "Greetings, Onii-san."

"Hn." Onii-san stepped into the room to frown at the boys. "Stupid herbivores," he commented with disgust. "Masami is not a herbivore."

"Hibari-san?" An older boy with gelled-up black hair and a twig in his mouth poked his head into the room. "Is there a...problem...?" He trailed off, staring blankly at Masami and then at Kyoya. Ah, he must be more intelligent than the herbivores she had just defeated.

"Who's this, Onii-san?" she asked, unperturbed by the slight choking sound that followed. To put it lightly, her brother wasn't the most open of people. He had probably never even mentioned a sister before.

"Masami, this is Kusakabe Tetsuya," Onii-san said curtly, prodding one of the herbivores with a none-too-gentle boot and scowling when there was a pained groan in response. "Tetsuya, this is Masami, my younger sister."

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Kusakabe-san," Masami said, flowing into another bow. "Please, call me Masami." To hold off on the confusion of which Hibari he was addressing.

"O-Of course. It's an honor to meet you, Masami-san," Tetsuya returned, the faintest traces of awe in his voice as he bowed back deeply. She assumed he was her brother's partner in crime, if not friend.

"Y-You bitch!" a voice cut in. Oh, the third student was still conscious, glaring for all his worth even as he panted into the floor. It was kind of pathetic really.

“You said that already,” Masami pointed out.

Onii-san didn’t even bother wasting his words. A swift strike from a tonfa was quick to shut the nuisance up.

(Yumiko-sensei never did quite figure out what all the yelling had been about. When she got there, she found Masami peacefully reading her book alone. All was as it should be in the classroom.

She frowned and was met with a clueless look. "Sensei? Is everything alright?" Masami asked, tilting her head to the side.

Yumiko resisted the urge to squeal. So cute! And sweet, too; the only one in her class who was well-behaved at all times, even if Yumiko did have plans to contact the girl's parents about her apparent unwillingness to socialize with classmates of her age.

"Not at all, sweetheart," Yumiko said with a smile and went off to brag to the other teachers.

Masami went back to reading about rainstorms.)

Otou-san only nodded and went off to find Okaa-san when Masami told him about her day that afternoon, showing no concern over the little incident, or unbeknownst to the children, the phone calls he'd received earlier in the day.

Masami shrugged and prepared some tea. She was gaining a preference for black tea, although green wasn't so bad. White tended to be a little too bland for her. Onii-san had tasted properly prepared matcha tea once and settled on it for the rest of his life.

Later that night, Okaa-san and Otou-san — who were both home at the same time for the first time in the past eleven months — informed Masami and Kyoya that they were both expected in the sitting room for about the first time...ever.

Masami settled onto the unoccupied zabuton beside her brother and stared across at her parents. What was going on? Was she in trouble for some reason? Was Onii-san in trouble? Had something happened?

Otou-san was the one to drop the bomb. "Kyoya, Masami, it's time for Rika and I to leave."

...wait, what?

"What do you mean, Otou-san?" Onii-san narrowed his eyes, frowning. He didn't like surprises.

"It's simple," Okaa-san said, taking a sip of her tea. "You and Masami are both in school now. You know how to take care of yourselves — the incident today proves that. There is no need for us to coddle you anymore."

Masami breathed deeply and tried to remember her lessons. Okaa-san would be disappointed in her if she started throwing thoughtless questions at them, despite her (understandable) dismay at this news. "Where are you going?"

"Wherever our work takes us," Otou-san said. Reaching into the small bag he had set on the table, he retrieved two cell phones. "We have programmed our emergency numbers into these phones. If you need to reach us, you know how."

"Money will not be an issue." Okaa-san put her teacup down, leveling her children with a steely gaze. "Masami, I've taken you shopping before; you know what you need to buy. Should there be any problems, ask Kyoya."

Their parents were leaving. It would only be Kyoya and Masami left in their ancestral home. If they were to require help, they would receive none. If they got in trouble, they would have to get themselves out of it. They would be near fully independent, and that —

"Will you ever come back?" Masami asked softly, finding, to her own surprise, that once she thought about it, living alone with Onii-san wasn't nearly as scary as it probably should be. Their parents had been pulling away in small increments for a long time now.

"Of course. But only when we have the time and leisure, so don't count on it," Otou-san warned, sipping his tea as if nothing was wrong.

And nothing really was.

"We'll be fine," Onii-san said firmly, no room for doubt in his voice. "You are leaving tonight?"

"That's correct." Nodding sharply, Okaa-san rose to her feet with the liquid-like grace that Masami hadn't yet achieved. "Do not disappoint us," she ordered, a sentiment clearly echoed by their father.

Masami dipped her head in consent while Onii-san scowled but nodded back. "Safe traveling, Okaa-san, Otou-san," she said quietly.

Rika vanished into the night without another word.

Satoshi stood up as well but spared the time to hug his children briefly. Masami returned the gesture, and though Kyoya tensed, he didn't push his father away. In comparison to Okaa-san, Otou-san had always been the more affectionate one.

"Take care of each other," Satoshi said and then was gone himself.

Kyoya and Masami glanced at each other. It was official. They were on their own now.

"Shall we dance?" she offered, flipping her fan in the air.

He smirked and led the way to the dojo.

A year passed in relative peace, the two children gradually learning and adapting to their new situation. It wasn't super difficult. They had been well-prepared, after all, even if they hadn't been aware of it at the time.

As Rika had suggested, Masami took care of the general shopping. The regulars in the grocery store grew used to Masami wandering down this aisle or that and became fond of her, frequently offering assistance with choosing produce. She accepted graciously each time, of course. It was always good to network.

Kyoya came to view the required cleaning of the house as training. He set a goal for himself, one hour max, and made certain that their home was spotless in the allotted time. It was surprisingly effective.

Sweeping might be Kyoya's job, but laundry was Masami's. Her culinary skill had far surpassed her brother's, hence Masami made all the meals. Accordingly, Kyoya did the dishes. They split the chores, kept an eye on each other, but didn't bother to try and issue any orders.

That would have been pointless; neither of them had a personality that liked restraint.

Luckily, with their combined combat training, no one dared to question the validity of two children, one six and one eight, living alone, especially since they had the Hibari surname. Not that it would have changed anything but avoiding trouble was all good and well.

Rika had come back once — to teach them how to hide dead bodies — and Satoshi had come back twice — to drill them on Mafia Politics —but Masami liked to think they were doing fairly well by themselves.

But now she was in first grade and he was in third grade, and Kyoya wanted to expand his patrols.

Masami blinked at Kyoya over the chabudai. "You want to start patrolling the whole of Namimori?" Before and after school apparently.

"Why not?" he reasoned. "This town is Hibari Territory. Our house was one of the first to be constructed on this land. It is my duty." And Kyoya took duty seriously.

She frowned, tilting her head to the side. Masami knew her brother: he might listen to her on occasion, but if he really wanted to do something, he would, regardless of her thoughts on the matter.

So the only reason he would tell her…was if she was somehow involved in this plan too.

"And me?" Masami could hold her own against Kyoya for twenty minutes before exhaustion tripped her up now, but he could be overprotective. With some reason perhaps — there had been four more incidents at school — but still.

It wasn't as if any of those incidents had amounted to anything but broken dance partners.

A flash of something that could have been approval flickered across his face. Masami saw it sometimes when they were training and she got a good blow in, a rarity that was becoming more and more common these days. "You're coming with me."

She thought about it and shrugged; training then. Stamina, discipline, surveillance, and time with her brother. All good things. "Okay," Masami agreed easily.

And that was that.

Every morning, at sunrise, Kyoya would wake Masami up, and she would make them breakfast. They would meet up with Tetsuya — who had finally started calling Onii-san "Kyoya-san" to further dissuade a misunderstanding — and they would inspect the streets of Namimori.

If they caught someone doing something against the rules — i.e. crowding, littering, bullying, shouting, annoying Kyoya on a bad day, etc. — Kyoya would bite them to death, Tetsuya would lug them to a safe location afterward, and Masami would watch idly from a distance. Then, they would go to school. The same thing occurred after school but ended with the three separating at sunset so Tetsuya could get home and Masami and Kyoya could eat dinner.

Another year passed.

On her birthday, Kyoya gifted Masami a pretty white tessen with chromoly steel black foils that mirrored her gunsen. A tessen was sturdier than a gunsen, capable of bashing someone unconscious without much effort on her part. On the other hand, the gunsen was lighter and better at slashing, so they made a good pair. Masami was delighted and made sure to show her thanks with a hamburger steak the following night. 

When his birthday came around in the spring, her gift was a new pair of tonfa, this one with spikes on the sides and ends that released flails. In response, Kyoya brought home dango the next day. While finishing the dango off, she wondered if it said something about their family that weapons, martial art scrolls, and new techniques were the norm for gifts. Probably, but she didn't mind, so Masami let things be.

Tetsuya gave Masami a flower kanzashi with a sharpened end on her birthday and Kyoya a cashmere sweater for his. When his birthday arrived, Masami baked him a three-tier cake and Kyoya silently handed him a stun gun. They were tactful enough not to mention the tears in their friend's eyes before he wiped them away.

And then it was time for summer break.

They had a vast garden behind their house, with colorful Japanese maple trees and lush bamboo. Pine trees towered over a clear cerulean pond filled with koi and surrounded by vibrant azaleas, a designated rock garden not far away. It was normally Masami who raked the rock garden when the mood was upon her, but Kyoya occasionally pitched in when he was bored and had nothing else to do. She was no master gardener, but she had learned enough from her mother to take care of the garden when needed.

Sometimes, on the nice, cloudy days when the sky was bright blue and the sun was gracious, the siblings liked to take a nap outside, with Kyoya using his jacket as a pillow and Masami curled up next to her big brother. It was a lazy, hazy method of dwindling the hours away.

But when it stormed...

Masami danced on the damp ground on bare feet, her blue yukata completely soaked through. Her loose hair, long enough to reach the small of her back now, stuck to her neck, heavy with rain. She closed her eyes, navigating her way around through pure instinct, the moss soft and springy underneath her feet. The wind lashed, laughing, and the new maple tree leaves waved, drops of water sliding smoothly off of the surface to fall into the disturbed pond. She swayed and moved to the beat of her heart, to the rhythm of the summer shower, to the melody of nature.

"You're going to catch a cold," Kyoya commented from where he was sitting on the engawa in a black kinagashi, shielded from the rain by the roof to view the world from beyond a curtain of sheer water. Thunder boomed from the sky; he didn’t so much as blink.

The air smelled like ozone and life and beauty.

Masami smiled and lifted her head so the torrent could fall directly on her face, easily avoiding all the sharp, slippery rocks beneath foot while fans cut gleefully through the pathways of countless raindrops. "It's alright, Onii-san." Lightning sparked, brilliant and dazzling, a jagged arrow in the darkened skies.

She laughed.

There was a special... wildness that ran in their Clan, the sort of thing that was always known by all and spoken out loud by none. A Hibari did as they wished, went where they wanted, carved out their legacy in blood and steel. They had their own kind of honor, moral, code, and they stood by it. The Clan was priority, and not a single member would ever betray Family, but beyond that one rule, there were no others. That was how it had been since their beginning and that was still how they raised their children today.

(Later, she would learn that this was due to the Cloud and Storm Flames that lingered in their blood. But that was later.)

Kyoya and Masami had both inherited this background. The urge to run with the wind, drift along the open roads, follow no rules but the ones that they had created themselves. It was an insatiable wanderlust, unreasonable restlessness, coiled energy that begged to be released.

Kyoya conducted his fervor through the thrill of the fight. He could let loose when faced with the give and return of blows, the pump of blood and the pounding of hearts, the gratification of laying an enemy low before him, the satisfaction of a good, knock-down, drag-out spar.

Masami found her own freedom in the dance, although she enjoyed battle, especially since favorable fights were dances. In the rush of exhilaration as feet touched the ground only to rise again as if flying, in the easy harmony between body and music, in music and movement.

So, in the rain, while thunder and lightning entwined like long-lost friends far above, Masami danced in the storm and Kyoya watched.

It was back to school again soon enough.

'Boring,' was Masami's continued one and only assessment of her class. With the initial educational boost from her parents, most of her classes were terribly tedious. When she wasn't patrolling with Kyoya and Tetsuya, she could only resort to reading. Or in today's case, intelligence gathering. It wouldn't do for her skills to rust while Rika was gone.

Suppressing a sigh, she discreetly retrieved a paper from under her folder. It was the school registry. This one was of the fifth graders, still warm from when she had printed it out from the library fifteen minutes ago. Sliding it between the pages of her book, she proceeded to study silently rather than pay attention in Math. It wasn't as if she didn't already know how to add and subtract two-digit numbers. If the teachers couldn’t pass her time productively, she would do so herself.

After memorizing all the data on the class of 2-A, Masami leaned back and decided to analyze her classmates instead. There really was nothing else to do, and it was a good mental exercise that Rika had encouraged.

Let's see...her eyes landed on short golden brown hair. Sasagawa Kyoko was quite popular in their class, known to be kind and carefree, with an older brother: Sasagawa Ryohei, a loud boxer who liked to give Kyoya trouble sometimes. The friend she was whispering to was Kurokawa Hana, moderately more observant and intelligent than the rest of their classmates with a sharp tongue and a temper to go along with it. The two had been friends since they were in their diapers, and that was unlikely to change soon.

Behind Hana was Yamamoto Takeshi, a budding baseball player with a perpetual smile on his face and an easy-going attitude. His grades were somewhat below average though his sports prowess was beginning to attract notice.

Letting her gaze drift, Masami named details and specifics on each of her classmates, eventually arriving on a boy with gravity-defying brown hair in the very back, huddled in on himself with a confused look in his brown eyes.

Sawada Tsunayoshi, she thought with an inward sigh. Masami remembered the boy from before, but unfortunately, he hadn't improved like she had believed. Constantly bullied, an average student at best, awful at sports...the list went on.

As far as she was aware, he had no friends.

While not quite as much of a loner as her brother was — she could, at least, tolerate stupid "herbivores" and "crowding" — Masami was in no way a social butterfly herself. Generally alone, except for lunch when she joined Kyoya and Tetsuya on the rooftop, Masami kept to herself, polite when talked to but pointedly distant and aloof. If her brother hadn't been The Hibari Kyoya, there most likely would have been more attempts at friendship and pointed talks from teachers, but he was and everyone knew of his ever-growing reputation.

Mostly, they were just relieved that his sister wouldn't "bite them to death" for arriving to class two seconds after the bell. Though, sometimes when she was particularly bored, she was tempted. It would be so easy...

But that wasn't good for her stellar student image now, was it? With her grades and manners — that had been quite literally beaten into her, mind you — the teachers considered her an angel admist a classroom of little mischievous devils.

(Albeit, somehow, that very same angel had a demon of a brother that she hung around on a regular basis. Oh well, they figured, no one was perfect, not even little pretty cherubs.)

Since Okaa-san had made it clear that a good reputation and positive assumptions were advantages — a bad reputation had its uses, too, but good ones were best — Masami did her best to encourage that view discreetly.

No one expected an angel to set the world on fire after all.

The year after that — because time passed very, very quickly when you weren't looking — there was a fight with a bunch of delinquents that got out of hand. They had been harassing a poor store owner with graffiti and threats, and Kyoya caught them red-handed soon enough.

It started with a crowd of them surrounding a ten-year-old Kyoya, armed with brass knuckles and smug looks, as if they thought they could beat him, as if strength in numbers was enough to even out the odds.

Kyoya scoffed — there wasn't a chance in their herbivore heaven. The difference between herbivores and carnivores was far too vast to be bridged so simply.

"Vandalism and harassment will not be tolerated," he stated, tonfa at the ready. "You will all be bitten to death."

"Tch, who do you think you are?!" one of the yakuza yapped, clearly not understanding his position. "Let's teach him a lesson, guys!"

And they, being the stupid herbivores that they were, charged with loud, annoying cries.

Kyoya scoffed and threw himself into the heat of the battle. It was instinctive, the dodging of strikes, the returning blows, the steps and moves, like the dance his sister called it. Blood dripped to the ground, the scent of iron heavy in the air, pained cries of no concern of his, a familiar face right in front of him —

He hissed angrily, twisting to the side at the last moment. His tonfa hit her tessen sparsely and was promptly directed to a wall that crumbled under the blow. Yanking the tonfa back, Kyoya stared at his little sister.

Masami was familiar enough with his attacks that she hadn't faltered under the brutal strength of it and met his eyes squarely. There was no regret, no hesitation, only cool reason and simple pragmatism.

"What are you doing!?" Kyoya barked, incensed, infuriated, heart rate increasing without conscious control. He could have hurt her; that was meant to be the finishing blow to one of the pathetic herbivores.

"I think that's enough, Onii-san," Masami said quietly but firmly. She stood ramrod straight in front of the pile of bloodied delinquents, unyielding for all that she was still tiny.

Kyoya scowled, eyes narrowing in clear warning. "Get out of my way. The herbivores must be bitten to death for disrupting the peace of Namimori."

"Look at them, Onii-san." She didn't step aside as she should but raised her hand to gesture with her fan towards his fallen prey. "They've already been punished. Any further and they'll be maimed or dead."

One of the still conscious herbivores whimpered at the last part, but they both ignored him.

"It doesn't matter," he decided, lifting up his tonfa once more. "If they die, it'll simply mean they'll never again be a nuisance."

Masami didn't flinch as the herbivores did but stood her ground and shook her head. "Murderers are against the law, too," she said. "If you kill, the police won't be lenient."

That was...true. Their father had significant pull within the police department, so they had been left alone for the most part, but an actual murder in broad daylight with witnesses wasn’t something even he could cover up so easily.

Kyoya thought about it, tension a humming, live wire between them. He glanced at the delinquents, at his tonfa, at Masami. At the consequences implied in her voice, at the quiet resolve in those identical gray eyes, at the tessen in her hand.

He didn't want to fight his sister. Not like this.

He reined in his bloodlust and put his tonfa away.

Masami smiled. "Thank you, Onii-san." Turning to Tetsuya, who'd lingered in the background anxiously and had doubtlessly been the one to fetch her from the bookstore in the first place, she advised, "Call the ambulance."

Tetsuya nodded and dug out his phone, punching in the numbers while Masami turned at last to look at the weak herbivores she'd saved. Regarding them for a moment, fan held in front of her face, she shook her head again. "There's a sushi store three blocks down we have never visited," she announced, stepping to Kyoya's side lightly. "I would like to investigate, Onii-san, Kusakabe-san."

"Hn." Spinning on his heel, Kyoya walked out of the back alley he had cornered the herbivores in, hearing Masami's muted footsteps and Tetsuya's heavier tread as they followed him.

When his sister handed him a silk handkerchief silently, he cleaned the blood off of his tonfa and put them away. Abruptly catching sight of the black case she held in her hand, he inquired, "What did you buy?"

"A pair of reading glasses."

Kyoya blinked. "Your sight?" While far from participating in heart-to-heart talks every week, the siblings did make a point to share important information with each other, but Masami had made no mention of this.

"Far sighted, just a bit," Masami said, unconcerned. "The optometrist was of the opinion that, other than reading, I would be fine without glasses on a daily basis."

He nodded curtly and let the subject go.

(The food at TakeSushi wasn't half-bad.)

When Sasagawa Kyoko was nine years old, she was partnered up with Hibari Masami for a science project.

She had always been aware of the other girl, of course. Everyone was. The little sister of the famed Hibari Kyoya, Masami was the teacher's pet — who no one dared to call out — incredibly polite, and while not exactly mean or scary, put on a pedestal by just about everyone in the school.

Or, at least, that was what Kyoko had heard. Rumors weren't very reliable in fourth grade (or in any grade, come to think of it), but rumors, she reasoned, must have some sort of beginning.

Needless to say, she couldn't help but be slightly nervous when it was time to approach Masami after they were dismissed by the teacher. What if Masami didn't like her? Well, Masami probably wouldn't like her since she didn't seem to like anyone, but what if Masami was mean about it?

"Stop worrying about it," was the advice Hana offered. "She's just another classmate, violent brother or not. It's not like she'll do anything to you. And besides, you have your own violent brother to protect you, don't you?"

"Hana!" Kyoko protested. "Don't call Nii-chan that! He's promised me he'll try and avoid fighting from now on anyways."

"Yeah, yeah." Hana rolled her eyes. "We'll see how long that lasts. Now go and talk to your partner. Dawdling about isn't going to change anything."

Kyoko winced but knew that Hana was right in that blunt way of hers. Taking a deep breath and squaring her shoulders, she wove around the students planning out their projects to the desk on the right corner, backed on two sides by a wall and a window.

Masami was flipping through her textbook, face unreadable. She really was quite pretty, Kyoko thought. If she put in the effort, Masami could probably become one of the popular kids. But she doubted her quiet, indifferent classmate cared about that.

Glancing up at that very instant, Masami assessed Kyoko with a flick of keen eyes and nodded in greeting. "Sasagawa-san. It's a pleasure to work with you," she said with a slight curve of her lips.

Somewhat taken back, Kyoko swiftly regained her composure and smiled back brightly, chirping, "It's wonderful to work with you as well, Hibari-san!" If nothing else, her classmate was very smart.

"Please, call me Masami," came the mild request.

Kyoko lit up, relieved. It looked like her new partner wasn't so bad, after all. "Of course!" Opening her mouth to suggest the favor be returned, Kyoko thought of how formal Masami was and reconsidered quietly. Maybe after they knew each other better.

Dumping her stuff on a nearby desk instead, Kyoko dragged the chair over to make working with Masami easier. "So, shall we start?"

"I believe we shall."

Thankfully, Masami discovered that Kyoko, while honey-sweet to the point of making her head hurt, was not that bad of a partner. She knew how to research well and did her share of the work, despite seeming to not know the value of silence.

It was a tad disconcerting for Masami, who generally spent time with Kyoya, who was far from verbose, and Tetsuya, who was a boy of few words himself, but she rapidly readjusted to listening to all of the gossip in their school. Masami had never particularly been interested in such things, but Rika had taught her how to recognize a profitable informant when she saw one.

It helped that Kyoko was much beloved in their school. People told her all sorts of things without any prompting.

After finishing their project with a grade of ninety-five — adequate — Masami realized that Kyoko truly was too friendly for her own good. The other girl had somehow gotten it into her head that Masami was a nice, sweet girl who was simply misunderstood and needed her friendship. Masami didn't know how that had happened but eventually relented enough to keep a casual acquaintance with Kyoko after two weeks of cheerfully attempted conversations. An informant was an informant.

At least Kyoko never tried to get Masami to join her group for lunch. Disregarding how noisy she had observed that crowd to be, Kyoya would have drawn the line at that. And while Kyoko's cheerful, unrelenting chatter could be annoying at times, Masami would rather not see her absent-minded classmate being hunted down by her brother.

Through her interactions with Kyoko, Masami gradually grew to know Kurokawa Hana as well. To her relief, Hana wasn't as overbearingly bubbly as Kyoko was but possessed a dry wit and a wry sense of humor. Since Hana was sharp enough to keep up with Masami, Masami could put up with Hana.

And at the end of that year, Kyoya and Tetsuya graduated.

Masami couldn't say she was too thrilled about that.

"Namimori Middle then?" Masami asked during lunch in the last month of school, sitting in seiza on a zabuton she had placed on the rooftop.

"Yes. I will create a Disciplinary Committee," Kyoya stated, lounging on the bench with the bento she had thrown together that morning. "Tetsuya will be its first member."

"Who else?" Knowing her brother, all the problems would be solved with violence, meaning members who knew how to fight were required.

Kyoya paused and gave her a look.

Oh, right. Onii-san didn't deign to give pathetic herbivores his attention. Why would he have any idea about potential members beyond their small group? As soon as she graduated, Masami would no doubt be inducted into this committee, but that was still two years away.

And a committee needed more than two people. Hmm.

"Onii-san, do you remember that group of delinquents you danced with all those years back?" she asked. Masami had certainly seen them around, lurking in the shadows before a sharp look or a beating from Kyoya sent them running.

She was pretty sure she had seen stars in their eyes the last few times.

He nodded, chewing on some teriyaki.

"Why don't you go and recruit them for your committee? They know how to fight, they fear and respect you; they would be good subordinates with a few rounds of training." Or whatever her brother counted as "training".

Kyoya deliberated the idea for the rest of lunch while Masami and Tetsuya waited patiently. Finally, he said, "Tetsuya, you know where these herbivores crowd?"

"Hai, Kyoya-san." Tetsuya’s job was to keep an eye out and an ear to the ground, especially on the herbivores that Kyoya had already bitten to death in case they started having foolish ideas. He also knew of the local yakuza gang and dealt with the police when necessary.

Kyoya nodded and stood up, dumping his lunch in a nearby recycling can. "After school."

Kyoya's idea of recruitment was to storm into their base, startle the delinquents out of their wits, and demand they join his committee or be bitten to death. Again.

Sweatdropping, Tetsuya cast a desperate look at Masami, only to find her covering a smile with her black fan. Evidently, she would be of no help in this situation.

Why was it always on him...?

Tetsuya sighed and stepped forward, holding a clipboard and drawing the attention of the terrified delinquents to him. "Alright, everyone interested over here! I'm going to be taking names and then I'll help register you lot with Namimori Middle."

...he really had no clue how the delinquents suddenly got it into their minds that he was their Savior and ended up copying his hairstyle to display their eternal gratitude.

Granted, Tetsuya should have known better than to ask the Hibari Siblings for explanations. Kyoya merely shrugged indifferently, and Masami giggled from behind her fan.

"Just accept it, Kusakabe-san," she recommended. "It won't go away anytime soon."

Tetsuya groaned and went off to write up training schedules. Kyoya had high standards (read: nigh-impossible standards) and if these ex-delinquents didn't reach those standards, they would be bitten to death. Again.

Two weeks into the summer, Masami opened the door to see a baby waiting for her. She paused, taking in the black braided hair, red clothes and pacifier, as well as the heavy sense of power that clung to him. There was even a sleeping monkey curled around the back of his neck.

This was no ordinary baby. As for who...she had a notion but best to confirm it.

"Greetings," she said, dipping into a bow because her mother hadn't raised her to be rude. "My name is Hibari Masami. Who might you be?"

He smiled, bowing back. "I am Fon, your granduncle. It's a pleasure to meet you, Masami."

Ah. She sighed inwardly; that was who she'd thought he might have been. She had never actually met him before, although she knew he had visited before she was born. His...peculiar situation was another one of those unsaid secrets in their Clan, and Masami only knew that he had once been an adult and should be treated as such. Outwardly, she smiled back and stepped back. "Please, come in, Fon-san. There is tea waiting on the table."

Fon nodded and was soon seated on a zabuton in the sitting room. "It has been a while since I've enjoyed tea in this room," he mused, hands wrapped around his hot teacup. "This is delicious, Masami."

"Thank you, Fon-san." Refilling his cup when he finished, she inquired delicately, "What brings you here from China?" Her granduncle, she knew, was of the Chinese Triads, one of the shadowy Clan secrets that Satoshi had mentioned once or twice during her lessons.

"I was completing a job in Okinawa and thought I should drop by," Fon said. "Rika and Satoshi have told me many good things about you and your brother. Speaking of Kyoya, where is he?"

"Overlooking remedial school," Masami explained. "He keeps the students under control."

She would have been with him but had decided that she wanted to spend this summer at home rather than under the scorching sun. Kyoya hadn't exactly agreed despite her tenth birthday having passed months ago, so they had ended up striking a bargain: if she could dance against him for an hour without faltering, then she was strong enough to be on her own. Sore and sweaty, Masami had ended up winning that deal after a truly intense dance that had lasted an hour and two minutes, even though she'd technically lost the match, so here she was, happily home alone.

It was just as well. Kyoya disapproved of the Chinese Triads and their traditions.

"I see." A peaceful pause while old, knowing eyes analyzed Masami. "Your brother doesn't like me, does he?"

She chose her words carefully, hiding her unease at being read so effortlessly. "He does not like your employers. Onii-san does not know you."

"But in his mind, there is little difference," Fon concluded.

Perhaps. Masami sipped her tea and said instead, "Will you stay the night, Fon-san?" Assuming her brother didn't kick him out the second he returned home.

Fon smiled and shook his head, flowing to his small feet. "I came to visit my grandniece and grandnephew. Thank you for the hospitality, Masami. I think I'll go and swing by the school on my way out."

She smiled back and rose as well to see him out the door, bowing as she should. "Best of luck, Fon-san."

Four hours later, Masami watched calmly as Kyoya arrived back home, face pinched and body rigid. He stared at her. "Masami."

"We talked over tea," she said, flipping through a book on Switzerland. "He's not so bad, Onii-san."

"He's with the Chinese Triads," he rebuked as if that explained everything. In Kyoya's world, it probably did.

Masami merely sighed. "Please eat your hamburger steak, Onii-san."

With Kyoya and Tetsuya gone from Namimori Elementary School, some things changed and some things stayed the same. As it was an elementary school, the rule breaking rose, as was expected, but it wasn't drastic. It wasn't as if there was fighting in the hallways every day. But now students could be late by a few minutes without the risk of being bitten to death. They could slack off and occasionally litter. 

Masami wasn't Kyoya — she didn't particularly care if some trash never made it to the trash bins. However, with her brother and their friend gone, she had the rooftop all to herself and the quiet was stifling in a way it had never been before.

Kyoko offered her companionship, of course, but Masami didn't like the rambunctious activities of the cheerful girl's friends either. Hana was the one who'd finally hissed in Kyoko's ear to stop pestering Masami as her ever-polite smile started to strain.

Masami eventually took to wandering the halls during lunch, testing her knowledge of the students and her own grace in weaving between the many bodies crowding the school without brushing against a single one.

It was on one such stroll that she re-encountered Sawada Tsunayoshi.

Chapter Text

Foxtrot: a ballroom dance in 4/4 time, with alternation of two slow and two quick steps.

Sawada Tsunayoshi knew he was Dame. It was depressingly obvious in fact.

He got terrible grades, he was horrible at sports, and he had zero friends. Even Nana, his own mother, didn't believe he would ever be much of anything, and if that didn't say something, what did?

Which was why he wasn't in the least bit surprised when, not two months into fifth grade, the bullying was so bad he was running through the halls at top speed, clinging desperately to his lunch.

"Get back here, Dame-Tsuna!" his current tormentor yelled, right behind him with a bunch of his lackeys. "Don't be a coward on top of being stupid, pathetic, and idiotic!"

"N-No!" Tsuna shouted back defiantly only to promptly trip. "Ow!" Sprawling hard on the ground, bento in hand, he rubbed at the large bump on his head and gulped when the bullies loomed over him with triumphant looks.

"We've got you now!" Fukao Shoda, the head school bully now that The Hibari Kyoya was gone, held out a meaty hand. "Well, Dame-Tsuna? Give me your lunch now and maybe I'll go easy on you later."

Tsuna grimaced, scrambling backward until he hit a wall. Darn it, dead end. But this was the delicious lunch his mom had taken the time to prepare for him... "Go a-away, Sh-Shoda!"

A vein popped on Shoda's forehead. "Huh? What was that?!" He cracked his knuckles, his friends crowding around Tsuna in a half circle. "Guys, I think Dame-Tsuna needs some reminders on who's in charge here!"

"Right!" they yelled and raised their fists. "You're not going to forget this, Dame-Tsuna!"

Tsuna could only wince and raise his arms over his head. He hoped this would be over quickly. There was still that science test he needed to study for — he'd only gotten a ten on the last one — and he'd wanted to see Kyoko-chan today...!

"Excuse me," a soft, sweet voice cut in, right before the first blow would have landed, "Is there something wrong here?"

Everyone froze.

Shoda unfroze first and spun on his heel while his friends began panicking, arms waving wildly in the air. "A-Ah! M-Masami-san! I-I didn't see you there!" he exclaimed, rubbing the back of his head with a laugh that was clearly forced.

Tsuna's eyes popped out, his heart skipping a beat. There was only one Masami he knew in the entire school who would make someone like Fukao Shoda nervous, and that was...that was. Hieeeeee! Leaning his body to the side, he peered past Shoda and swallowed hard.

Long black hair twisted into an elaborate hairstyle with fancy-looking kanzashi, several strands left to brush over her pale skin, Hibari Masami cut a scarily elegant figure with her unimpressed gray eyes and ornate white fan.

Speaking of...Tsuna furrowed his brow. Hadn't the one she'd been waving around last week black? He went out of his way to avoid Masami, but no one could ignore the folding fans she casually brought out in class to cool herself off with…even in the dead of winter.

None of the teachers ever called her out on it either.

"D-Don't worry! N-Nothing's w-wrong, Masami-san!" Shoda scrambled to reassure The Hibari Kyoya's sister, beads of sweat dripping down his face. "W-We just wanted to, uhh..."

"We w-wanted to e-eat lunch with Dame-Tsuna here!" Takiji, one of Shoda’s friends, piped up, grabbing Tsuna by the shoulders and holding him in front of the bullies as a human defense.

"Yeah! A-And give him a-advice from us upperclassmen, right, boys?" Shoda looked around frantically, glaring when his friends all froze up. "Right, boys?!"

"Urm..." Tsuna hung weakly from Takiji's hold and wondered how this was his life. His bento was still in his hands too.

"Right!" the lackeys chorused, shying away from the petite girl to huddle together behind their fearless leader who wouldn't actually be able to do anything if Masami seriously took offense and informed her super scary brother.

One slender eyebrow rose with what looked like a hint of doubt but Masami smiled kindly and nodded in acceptance. "I see. Helping a fellow student is a gracious act, Fukao-san, but I'd like Sawada-san to eat with me today."

...HIIIIIIIEEEEEE!?

Tsuna's jaw dropped to the floor while Shoda nodded as fast as he could, probably spraining his neck along the way. "O-Of course, M-Masami-san! I-I'll leave you t-two to it!" And with that, the crowd scattered, leaving trails of dust.

Tsuna fell to the floor for the second time that day with a muffled cry.

"Oww..." Whimpering, Tsuna sat up and dared to look up at Masami. This didn't make sense at all! Disregarding how and why she knew everyone’s names in the first place, she wanted to eat with him?! They'd never even talked before!

Masami's face was utterly unreadable, the fan she held over the bottom half of it not helping matters. Those eyes, though...those eyes...

Tsuna drooped miserably. He was being judged. And found lacking, no doubt. He always was.

"Sawada-san." The sound of the fan being snapped shut was loud in the silence, the clack of her heeled shoes gentle on the floor. "Come with me please."

The words were coached in a polite way, but Tsuna knew when he was being ordered. "Ha-Hai!" Fearing for his very life, he scurried up and tip-toed after his intimidating classmate.

The worst thing, he thought to himself as the students they passed began to whisper and gossip, was that Masami didn't look or act scary at all. Her every move was as graceful as the ballerinas on TV, her reputation spotless. No one had ever even heard her say a mean word about anyone.

She just was frightening. Somehow.

Gliding up a staircase he'd never had the courage to investigate before, Masami pulled a door open and stepped out into the searing sunshine. Tsuna's eyes widened as he followed her. "T-This is the rooftop!"

He'd heard that there was a way for students to get to the rooftop, but he spent most of his time running from bullies so he hadn't really paid any attention to the rumors. That, and people whispered that it was where the Hibari Siblings ate.

Well, Tsuna guessed there was some truth to that since Masami was the one who'd brought him here.

"Sawada-san."

"U-Uh, hai!" Head snapping up, Tsuna realized Masami had turned and was now looking at him. Hiiiieeee!

"If the other students are bothering you, you may eat lunch here," she allowed, seating herself on a nearby bench and removing a book from her bag. "They will not enter the rooftop."

'That's because you're here...' he thought with a sweatdrop. But, all things considered, Tsuna thought that was a pretty good deal for him, if rather out of the blue. At least Masami wasn't interested in bullying him.

Probably because he was so weak, he didn't even register on her radar. Maybe if he stayed quiet all the way, he wouldn't disturb her? He had no idea why she would offer but knew better than to this opportunity go. "T-Thank you very much, H-Hibari-san!" Tsuna stuttered, bowing deeply.

"Please, call me Masami."

"H-Hai!"

And although Tsuna couldn't help but be tense for the rest of lunch, waiting for a harsh strike or a scornful word...nothing happened. He ate his lunch in silence and she read her book.

It was strange, but he found he didn't mind the quiet. It was nice, nicer than the normal jeers and taunts.

Masami had never bothered to pay attention in class before. There was no point; she got good grades and the teachers were happy to let her be while they focused on the numbskulls that were her classmates.

But after yesterday's...encounter with Sawada Tsunayoshi, she reluctantly tuned into the world around her for a few days. Reconnaissance was a vital element when observing a relatively unknown individual. What she learned was, quite frankly, pitiful.

Even by normal standards.

(Tetsuya had informed her once or twice that her own expectations could be, along with her brother's, sky-high and utterly impossible for anyone not superhuman.)

In English:

"Sawada! What does this sentence say?"

"Er... the fire ran away...?"

"Wrong!"

"Dame-Tsuna..."

"He's such an idiot."

In Mathematics:

"Sawada! You failed again!"

"A-Ah! I'm sorry!"

"Haha, he got a twenty-two!"

"Dame-Tsuna failed!"

"That's no surprise."

In Physical Education:

"Tsuna, pass!"

"OOOF!"

"We lost again!"

"Dame-Tsuna, it's all your fault!"

"S-Sorry!"

At Lunch:

"Sawada-san." She had been somewhat surprised herself when Tsunayoshi had scurried back onto the rooftop for the second time and continued returning. He acted so much like a mouse that she'd thought he would scamper away from the shadow of a potential predator at the first opportunity.

Perhaps he had more backbone than she'd assumed. Perhaps.

Regardless, she had already made her decision and it was sure to be interesting. Although Masami had had no problems pushing herself to her limits in whatever she so chose, she had never tried to explore someone else's capabilities before. She wondered what she could make of this drowning boy once she pulled him out and taught him how to swim.

Maybe she could fashion a pair of wings for him and see him soar.

"H-Hai?!" Though his stutter and nervousness were rather annoying. Admittedly, this was the first time she'd spoken up since this arrangement had come into place.

Masami crossed her legs and peered at her classmate over the edge of her fan. "...sit up please."

"Hiiiieee!" Tsunayoshi squeaked, staring at her with clear confusion even as he instinctively obeyed. Yes, that was better, she could almost see... "W-Why?"

"You slouch," she said, waving her fan absently. "Hiding won't accomplish anything."

Tsunayoshi blushed crimson, looking down. "I know, b-but — "

"Please look people in the eye when you talk. If you don't respect yourself, no one will."

He scuffed his shoe on the ground. "Masami-san, it's okay, really. I'm used to it."

Masami considered that for a moment. Low self-confidence, unwillingness to change, a soul already crushed by this cruel world. This might take longer than she had originally planned. Now the question was: would it be worth it?

Well. With Kyoya and Tetsuya gone, she had been bored lately. And she did enjoy a challenge. She, a carnivore, would hardly back down over an obstacle of this magnitude.

"Then please become unused to it in my presence, Sawada-san," she said. "I'm afraid I simply will not deal with anyone who is not the best of the best."

"But I'm not the best at anything!" he protested, waving his arms around like a headless chicken.

"You'll learn." Masami pretended not to notice Tsunayoshi falling flat on his face in exasperation.

He'd learn. She had Rika as a training role model, after all.

It was a lie, Tsuna screamed inside his head a bare week later, running for his life wildly, tears falling down his face in streams. It was all a lie! Masami's goodness, her perfect reputation — everything was a lie! His world was a lie!

'Merciful Kami-sama, where are you?!' he cried out inwardly, lifting his hands up in supplication. 'Save me, save me!'  But there was no one here to rescue him from this torment as he slid into the finishing line, outright collapsing as his knees gave out.

"Fourteen minutes," recorded his tormentor, clicking her timer. "For one round around the school. It's a thirty-second improvement from yesterday. Well done, Sawada-san."

Tsuna knelt on the floor and prayed for deliverance, his sweat-soaked uniform sticking to his skin. Nana had been under the impression that he had been working out lately, and he had been too ashamed to tell her the truth:

He had been intimidated into working for a demon!

"Twenty push-ups, thirty sit-ups, forty squats, and fifty jumping jacks, please," Masami went right on entreating as if Tsuna wasn't already half dead from running.

"B-B-B-But, Masami-san—!" he whimpered, barely able to get to his feet. "I can't do it!" She couldn't expect him to be able to perform a task just because she said "please," did she?!

"Thirty, forty, fifty, sixty." She did.

Tsuna cried harder. The worst thing about training — dying! — under Masami's absolutely merciless tutelage was that she never argued back. She just upped the ante on whatever exercise he was to perform next.

"Has there been any trouble with the bullies lately?" she inquired two minutes later while Tsuna was on his twentieth push up and close to collapsing. Masami acted like she didn't notice (even though he knew she was supernaturally aware of everything around her), preoccupied with reading her newest book.

"N-No..." he trailed off, gasping for breath, arms shaking. He wasn't going to be able to make it! He was going to die! There could be no worse hell than this! "Y-You ch-chased t-them all a-aw-away."

In fact, Masami hadn't even needed to do anything. All she'd done was show up one day, walk down the corridor with Tsuna, and that was it. No one tried to bother him anymore. It was like having a secret guardian angel that he couldn't see but others could.

Such was the power of Hibari Masami!

Except, of course, Masami was no angel. No matter what the teachers and administrators thought. Nu-uh. Tsuna knew the truth and he was sticking with it!

"An advantageous outcome indeed," she mused now, brushing hair from her eyes. "And your math scores?"

Up, down, up down — he was at fifteen sit-ups! "U-Um, uhh, that is..."

"Sawada-san, please talk coherently." Hidden in the lovely tones of her voice, Tsuna heard the threat of more torture and almost lost track of his sit-ups.

"I got a forty-five on my last test!" he blurted out and followed up the confession with a wince. Nooo! He'd let the secret out! That meant even more running for him, no doubt!

There was a dangerous pause that Tsuna filled up with finishing his sit-ups at hyper speed and moving on to squats. Ow, ow, ow. His muscles...but he could feel her stare boring into the back of his skull. Oh, he was totally dead!

"...and are you satisfied with your score?" Masami asked at last, voice completely neutral.

Tsuna bit his lower lip, not daring to look up from his squats. Was this a trick question? "No...?"

"Are you answering me or asking me, Sawada-san?"

Oh no, his danger sense was flaring up! "NO!" he shouted.

"Then, in that case, feel free to answer these math problems while you do your jumping jacks."

"Hiiiieeee—!?" While he did jumping jacks? His brain would explode!

Masami didn't bother to listen to his whining. "Let's get started immediately. The square root of sixty-four is...?"

"Nice outfit, Onii-san," Masami commented two months later. There was even a red armband. Sometimes, it amused her to see her brother flaunt the very school rules he endorsed so strictly and violently.

"This is the Disciplinary Committee uniform," he explained. "Tetsuya came up with the idea last week."

"Do you like it?" The clean lines and cool old-fashioned formality actually looked quite befitting on him. The gakuran jacket gave off an appropriately frightening feel, not that her brother needed the help.

"It's suitable," Kyoya admitted grudgingly. He paused by the kitchen doorway, giving Masami a searching look. "I hear you've been seen in the company of a herbivore by the name of Sawada Tsunayoshi."

"You would be correct," Masami confirmed without missing a beat, stirring the pork stew slowly.

"...why?" His tone made it obvious he saw no reason his sister should associate with such a boring, dull creature.

She hesitated and promptly berated herself for the slip. Rika would never. "Oh, I was bored."

"Hn." There was a beat while Kyoya pondered the problem and then evidently dismissed it as something not to be concerned with. It wasn't as if Masami went around trying to dictate who he talked to. "Fine."

"Onii-san, why was there a decrease in our funds yesterday?" She added some salt and pepper, not particularly worried but interested in the reason. Kyoya wasn't one to purchase unnecessarily expensive things.

"...I bought a motorcycle." Though items that interested him didn't count as "unnecessary" apparently.

Masami blinked and turned to look at him. "A motorcycle? Do you know how to drive one?"

Kyoya shrugged. "I'll learn."

"Ah." She turned off the flame and ladled the soup into bowls. "Not near the school, please. There could be...damage." And that would only anger him. A Kyoya angry at himself was the most difficult Kyoya.

His pointed silence asked why the hell she was telling him the obvious.

"...and after you've mastered driving, teach me," she added.

"Hamburger steak for Sunday."

Masami shrugged, drinking her tea. "Fine."

"Fine," Kyoya echoed, more interested in his soup.

Before School:

"Three laps around the school please, Sawada-san."

"Bu-But, Masami-san — !"

"Four."

Tsuna cried buckets of tears as he forced himself to run around the school. "MASAMI-SAAAN!"

At Lunch:

"Questions six, eight, nine, twelve, and sixteen are wrong. Fix it, please." She handed him back his math homework.

"I don't know how, Masami-san! I'm sorry, I can't do this! It's impossible!" Tsuna's shoulders fell, eyes lowering.

Whack! 

"HIIIIIEEEEEEEE!" Laid flat on the rooftop, he got up sluggishly, hands over the developing lump on his head. Getting hit by a war fan, however lightly, tended to hurt. "Masami-san!"

"If you don't know how," Masami said from where she was sitting on the bench with her legs crossed, chin braced on her palm and furled fan twirling in the air, "then learn. Nothing is impossible."

Tsuna sniffed, rubbing away the tears in his eyes. "Y-You think I can?"

Her look was blatantly exasperated. "Haven't you understood yet, Sawada-san? I do not waste my time. Now, review your math textbook if you would, and revise your answers."

"HIIEEE!"

After School:

"AHH!" A swift kick sent Tsuna flopping back onto the rooftop. "Ow, ow, ow..."

"You need to work on your footwork," Masami noted, not even slightly winded.

Groaning, he got back up, wincing at the twinge of pain that said he would have yet another bruise. "Is this really necessary, Masami-san!?"

"Of course. It's undignified to fight another's battle, so you must learn how to defend yourself," she lectured, waving her fan. "As you have no combat ability whatsoever, it falls on me to teach you."

"But I don't even want to fight!" Tsuna argued, rubbing half-heartedly at his stomach. It didn't help that Masami was kicking his ass without her fans, which he knew were her primary weapons.

"That matters not. Willingly or not, there will be times in life where you must fight, and it certainly would not do for you to be defenseless then, now would it?"

He grumbled and sighed and whined but knew she was right and charged again. He was back in the dirt half a minute later.

"Please concentrate, Sawada-san."

"Neh, Masami-san?" Tsuna panted breathlessly, splayed out on the rooftop like a little kid trying to make a snow angel. His leg muscles burned from the running he'd done, and his heart was still pounding. He had a cramp too.

Maybe five cramps, now that he thought about it.

As always, Masami looked perfectly polished and relaxed on her bench, book in her lap and fan in hand. Tsuna was starting to think about bringing a miniature electric fan to school; it was so hot this month. Somehow, he was still pretty sure he would never look as put-together as she did.

"Yes, Sawada-san?" she answered without looking up, turning a page in her book.

"What are you reading?" he asked. His classmate was always reading something while she "helped" him.

"Today?" Masami adjusted her reading glasses absently. Tsuna found it totally unfair that glasses only made her look more intelligent while it would probably make him look even more like a brainless idiot. "A book on Japanese history."

"History?" He didn't know she liked history. Actually, he didn't know much about her at all, now that he thought about it.

"That's correct. I find it a fascinating subject." A small smile curved her lips, for once not distantly polite.

Tsuna turned and propped himself up on his elbows, suddenly interested. This was the first time he had actually heard anything personal about Masami, even though he had been talking to her for months. "Really?"

"Mm-hm. Did you know how many people died in the Nanjing Massacre?" she asked, casual as could be.

"Urg..." Tsuna winced, turning a little green. "No...?

Masami was all too happy to enlighten him.

CRASH!

On a perfectly normal Sunday morning while Masami was making some omelets for breakfast, a boy broke through the ranma in a shatter of glass and landed behind her, creating a crater in the floor and destroying several tatami mats. It was a testament to the composure that Rika had beaten into her that she didn't shriek outright.

Instead, Masami went very, very still, retrieving her tessen fan swiftly before turning and analyzing the situation with calm detachment. She shifted subtly into a combat position, stepping back a bit. With the amount of noise, Onii-san would be here in three to five minutes — he was a light sleeper.

"Whoo! This is Hibari's house, huh? How extreme!" A loud, male voice shouted from the bottom of the depression, the smoke clearing to reveal a boy with white hair around Kyoya's age in a jogging suit, beaming despite the lump on his head.

"...Greetings," Masami said delicately with a bow, determined to mask her surprise, wariness, and pure outrage with silky aplomb. Her window. Her floor. Her kitchen. Her foot tapped lightly on the ground. "Who might you be?"

The stranger looked up at her in surprise before getting to his feet and bowing back, his grin widening even further if possible. "Hello! I am Sasagawa Ryohei! Who are you?!"

"My name is Hibari Masami. I suppose you're here for my older brother, Hibari Kyoya?" She had never met this boy before, though she knew of him as Kyoko's older brother and a boxing fanatic. He was certainly very...enthusiastic.

"That's right! I'm here to defeat him to the extreme!" Ryohei climbed out of the hole to pause and look Masami over, appearing a bit puzzled. "You know, I never knew Hibari had a younger sister!"

"Well, now you do," she replied with an icy smile. "Would you like some tea?" It was only polite. Perhaps she would even slip some mild laxatives into the drink in the process.

"That's not necessary, Masami," a familiar voice interrupted from the doorway. "Herbivore, what are you doing here?"

Ryohei perked up, spinning around to face Kyoya with a friendly grin. "Hibari! There you are! Oi, why haven't you told me you had a sister? We could have bonded over being older brothers!"

"There was no need," Kyoya said coolly, leaning against the wall in a black jinbei. "And I have no wish to associate with herbivores."

Ryohei twitched, flames flaring in his eyes as he fell into a boxing stance. "What was that!? Come on, let's fight...to the EXTREME!"

Kyoya's eyes narrowed, his tonfa emerging in hand with a flicker of silver light. "That's fine with me. Trespassers will be bitten to death."

Really? "Not in the kitchen please," Masami cut in sleekly, voice perfectly mild. "Also, please refrain from causing property damage to my house the next time you come to visit, Sasagawa-san."

Ryohei threw back his head and laughed. "Don't be mad, Hibari! It's for the purpose of an extreme fight!" His teeth sparkled. Actually sparkled.

Masami considered that. "You know, I have lunch with your sister sometimes."

It was rather satisfying to watch Ryohei's face go a few shades paler and his smile waver. "How extreme!" he shouted nonetheless, if a bit less exuberantly. "In that case, I'll make sure to knock on the door the next time I challenge Hibari to an extreme fight! Will that be okay with you, Hibari?"

"Please, call me Masami," she said placidly, turning back to her omelets. "And that will be fine, should the 'door' turn out to be the front door. As for sparring, we do have a dojo for a reason, Onii-san."

Kyoya hmphed but turned sharply on his heel before his sister's wrath could be directed his way. "Come, herbivore. We have a biting to get to."

"Got it!" Ryohei gave Masami a thumbs-up, previous irritation disappearing like smoke. "See you later, Masami!"

She'd really rather not "see him later".

That was going to become annoying, she thought, particularly since she was fairly certain Ryohei wasn't the type to give up on something. Anything. Especially when it came to combat and...boxing. Sadly, since he wasn't at Onii-san's level — close, closer than anyone but Masami, but not there — Ryohei would be defeated and the cycle would repeat. Shaking her head, she dialed the construction workers for the broken window.

Ten minutes later, just as Masami was setting up the plates, Kyoya strolled into the dining room, unruffled and uninjured. Ryohei wasn't with him.

"Sasagawa-san?" she questioned.

"Gone. He's a herbivore."

"He'll be back, won't he?"

"He's a stubborn herbivore."

Masami sighed and ate her omelet.

Six months after they met, Masami brought a radio to the rooftop, completely out of the blue.

Tsuna blinked and stared blankly at the little black box. "...Masami-san?"

"Yes?" Clearly unconcerned, Masami sat down and began to eat her bento.

"Why did you bring a radio to school?" he asked, feeling a little slow.

"I thought it would be nice." She leaned down and turned the machine on.

Tsuna wasn't caught up with the recent popular songs at all, but even he recognized the upbeat song that began blaring before Masami grimaced and turned the volume down. But — "You like pop music, Masami-san?" He had never expected that; it just didn't seem to fit with her personality. If anything, he would have thought classical music would be her type. She seemed like the really old-fashioned, traditional kind of person...not that there was anything bad about that, of course!

"Not really," she revealed idly. "I enjoy music in general. But Sawada-san, I do believe you have an English quiz today?"

He gulped, sweating bullets. "Errm...yes?"

"Speak with conviction please."

"Yes!" He all but tore his bag open to get out the study materials.

She smiled. "How about I test you now? Each wrong answer will result in twenty push-ups, I think."

Even as Tsuna moaned and pleaded for mercy, his muscles straining and trembling, he noticed the way Masami's foot tapped to the beat of the music and the way she hummed along softly.

Maybe she played an instrument? He was too afraid to ask.

That year passed rapidly, and finally, they were starting their last year of elementary school.

Masami was rather glad of that. Perhaps middle school would be more interesting? All Kyoya would say of Namimori Middle was that there were a lot of herbivores to bite to death.

Four months in, Tsunayoshi was improving adequately. His scores were still far too close to failing, but he could at least block a blow or two from Masami, and his instincts were better than expected. A summer spent beating those reflexes into him probably helped.

She could almost say that she was pleased with his progress. He was doing well, he was trying his best (mostly), and that was all she really cared for. Surprisingly, he wasn't terrible company either.

And then, two weeks before December, her phone rang.

Masami froze in the middle of her first class of the day. Her phone was on vibrate, so no one else had noticed, but the problem was that only five people had this number: Kyoya, Tetsuya, Kyoko, Hana, and Tsunayoshi.

Her brother and his subordinate wouldn't call during school hours for anything but an emergency, of which she had heard none. The two girls were right there in class with her. That left a particular charge who hadn't come to school that day, the one she had been planning on tracking down as soon as school let out.

...oh dear.

Masami raised her hand. "May I go to the restroom, Sensei?" she questioned when the teacher called on her.

The man looked somewhat baffled — she usually went during lunch, if at all — but nodded. "O-Of course, Hibari-san."

She nodded and calmly walked out the door. After closing it behind her, Masami immediately broke out into a sprint, flipping open her phone at the same time. "Sawada-san? Is something wrong?"

"M-Masami-san!" As she had expected, his voice was high with anxiety and fear, breathless from what appeared to be exertion. "There's a bunch of yakuza guys chasing me!"

...Yakuza? What could Tsunayoshi, still about as hopelessly dangerous as a baby calf, have done to get the Yakuza on his back? Masami kept her voice calm, soothing. "Where are you at the moment?"

"Uhh...n-near the supermarket! A block to the left!"

"Alright, stay put please." That would take her...around three minutes if she pushed it. "How many of them are there?"

"I c-counted eight!"

He might have improved, but against eight yakuza or more, Tsunayoshi wouldn't stand a chance. He would be crushed like a bug. "Hide and wait for me to find you."

"W-Wait — !"

Click.

Tsuna huddled against the wall and closed his eyes, trying out some of the calming breathing exercises that Masami had taught him a few weeks ago.

Even after all this time, he could hardly believe that Hibari Masami had befriended someone like him. From all the whispers flying around the school when Masami occasionally walked with him through the hallways, no one else could either. But then, she never cared about that and he had learned not to either.

It wasn't the most stereotypical relationship, he knew. In fact, most people probably wouldn't even call it that. From what he had gathered, Masami, well... he didn't know. She never really spoke of why she had interfered that fateful day.

All Tsuna understood was that she had, and because Masami, as she had said, did not tolerate idiots — "herbivores," he had heard her mutter sometimes — she had taken it upon herself to correct some (all) of his perceived faults through whatever method worked.

It wasn't easy, of course. Being sorta-friends with Masami was difficult all on its own. Most of the time, it didn't even feel like a friendship to Tsuna, more like she was his senpai and he was her kohai, even though they were the same age, or maybe even a mentor and a student. Occasionally, when he was tired out and the wind was blowing and she was sitting nearby, the comfortable silence ringing in his ears, he regretted that polite distance between them quietly. She might know almost everything about him, but he didn't even know her favorite book.

(Sawada Tsunayoshi was a Sealed Sky with no Elements to call his own. Hibari Masami was a powerful Element with no Sky. They should have Harmonized easily but...)

The process of improvement was slow-going and painful, and Tsuna ended up going home with bruises and sore muscles more often than not (though never anything serious), but he didn't regret not leaving that rooftop when he had the chance. Things were...things were better now. His grades were rising gradually, his ingrained reflexes kept him from getting hit by the ball as often, and the bullies didn't dare bother him by virtue of Hibari Wrath. The one time Shoda had, Tsuna had managed, miracles of miracles, to trip him and run for it.

That had been a good day. Masami had even treated him to ice cream to celebrate. She had gotten mango.

"Do you see him?!"

"He couldn't have gone far!"

"Get that little brat!"

Tsuna suppressed the urge to blubber and curled in on himself even more, shivering slightly. How long had it been since Masami had disconnected the call? She was unbelievably fast, so hopefully she would get here before...

A shadow fell into the back alley. "Well, well, well. What do we have here? A little mouse, trying to hide."

Nope, of course not. Cause his luck just wasn't that good, was it? No, hahahaha, of course not.

Prying his eyes open, he found one of the yakuza standing before him with an ugly sneer, a gun held in hand. Tsuna trembled, fear seizing his heart. Was this how he was going to die?! From a bullet in the cold...?

Tsuna...he...he didn't want to die. Not like this.

"Say goodbye!" The yakuza smirked and raised his gun, pointing it directly at Tsuna. His finger tightened on the trigger, and Tsuna closed his eyes. If he was going to die, he didn't want his last memory to be of this man.

He thought of Mom, with her warm laughter and delicious dinners. He thought of Kyoko-chan, with her shining beauty and enduring kindness. He thought of Masami-san, with her enigmatic smiles and unyielding will —

He thought, with a desperation that could-would-should crack an old Seal: I don't want to die.

I DON'T WANT TO DIE —

BANG!

Tsuna waited for the impact, waited to die, but it never came. Instead, a gentle wind blew past him and a familiar voice purred, "Now, now. That's no way to start a dance. Perhaps you'd like to try again?"

Tsuna's eyes flew open, and he was met with the flutter of a warm cashmere coat and the swaying flowers that dangled from expensive kanzashi. "M-Masami-san!" Oh, thank Kami-sama! He was saved after all!

"Impressive..." the yakuza said, eyeing the hole in the wall to his right and the fan she held in her hand ever so nonchalantly. "To deflect a bullet...you must be trained in combat."

Masami smiled, spreading her fan open to cover the bottom half of her face. "Greetings," she said, dipping into a graceful bow. "Who might you be?" Tsuna wanted to groan; decorum at a time like this?!

The yakuza scoffed too, raising his gun once more to aim directly at her head. "It doesn't matter, now does it? I don't tell my name to dead little girls!"

...wait. Wait, no. No! Tsuna's breath caught, blood turning to ice in his veins as he finally comprehended the true danger. What had he been thinking!? How could he have been so selfish!? Masami might seem like smoke to him, ethereal and untouchable, but she was human, too, made of flesh and bones. A gun, a bullet, could seriously kill her! And he was the one who had led her right into this danger!

"M-Masami-san, please, r-run away!" he shouted, lurching forward on his knees. "You could get h-hurt!"

"Yeah, listen to your boy toy over there." The yakuza chortled. "You could get hurt."

"Shush now, Sawada-san," Masami murmured softly, ignoring the man. "It'll be all right. I'm not a newbie to this ball, you know. I won't step on my partner's feet." There was a snap! that signaled she had closed her fan again.

"Tch, what the hell are you talking about!?" The yakuza scowled, finger tightening and teeth gritted. He was going to fire! Tsuna shook his head— nononono! —and ran forward, thinking to push Masami out of the way...

...but she wasn't there anymore.

The gun in the yakuza's hands never fired, though its owner let out a cry. Masami landed lightly on her feet behind the falling man, the quick blow to his head that Tsuna had only just caught having forced the attacker unconscious.

Tsuna's mouth dropped open. No way...he hadn't even been able to see her move...

"I heard a gunshot!"

"What happened?"

"Aww, did Shinji get the brat already?"

"I wanted some fun!"

"Shut up, you morons, there's someone ahead!"

"Hiee! Masami-san, n-now what?!" Tsuna leaned against the wall, his knees rubbery. He didn't know what to do, and everything was so confusing! It had seemed like a normal day when he woke up, but now...

"Stay there, Sawada-san," she said, calm as ever, as if there weren't at least another seven yakuza looking to blow their heads off. "This dance will be over quickly."

Before Tsuna could ask what the hell his one and only friend was talking about, one of the yakuza stepped out from the shadows, a scowl on his scarred face and a bokken held tightly in his hands. "Oi! What did you do to Shinji?!"

Masami seemed to think about it for a moment before shrugging and smiling sweetly. "Who knows?"

"Why you — !" The man's face went apocalyptic, but she was moving before he had finished, striking him down effortlessly with a blow to the throat. He went down with a gurgled scream and his friends were felled in much the same way.

Not three minutes later, Masami was turning to a shell-shocked Tsuna, surrounded by unconscious bodies, that smile unchanged. "I do believe the problem has been resolved for now. Sawada-san, would you like to accompany me to my home?"

He could only nod dumbly and was gently led out of the alley by his classmate, who brought him to a fancy traditional Japanese house at the edge of Namimori that he'd never seen before, all gently slanted roofs and elegant pagodas. Tsuna didn't even know that houses were made so big nowadays.

Was Masami rich? Sometimes, with the way she acted...

Tsuna eventually ended up snuggling under the warmth of a kotatsu, a cup of hot tea in his hands. "Th-Thank you, Masami-san," he said, smiling tentatively at his classmate.

Masami had changed into a flowing violet kimono as soon as she arrived home and he was settled. Nodding in response, she peered at him with heavy-lidded eyes. "You're very welcome. Now, explain things to me, please."

"Oh, urm, right." He shouldn't have expected anything less from Masami. She always liked to know the complete facts of a situation before acting. There had been that one time when Tsuna had come to the rooftop with a sprained ankle...

That hadn't been pretty.

"It started a street from my house," Tsuna explained, looking down into his tea. "I had a bad feeling about today, so I was on the lookout and I caught the yakuza staring at me around the corners."

"A bad feeling?"

"Yeah, it's stupid, I know, but still..." He shrugged, feeling oddly defensive even though there had been no skepticism in Masami's voice.

"That's fine. Please continue."

"Right, so," Tsuna took a big gulp of tea for courage, found himself at the end of a vaguely disapproving look, "one of them made a comment about how if they killed me, they would get a reward or something. I ran and then, well..."

"You called me." Masami blinked slowly and rose to her feet, the embroidered white calla flowers dramatic against the violet fabric in the bright sunlight. "Sawada-san, perhaps we should take a field trip today. I'm sure our teachers will understand."

"A-Ah, where to?" Hastily getting to his feet, Tsuna finished off his tea and placed the cup back on the kotatsu. He was pretty sure his hands should be free for this "field trip."

"The West of Namimori." She smiled cryptically, a strange frosty edge to her voice, and retrieved a small black cylinder from a nearby cabinet. "Here, please take this, Sawada-san. You may need it."

"What is it?" He turned the cylinder over in his hands as he hurried after Masami, the difference between her silent steps and his noisy ones glaring.

"A taser," Masami said from the doorway, turning to look at Tsuna over her shoulder. "A good hit should give you enough time to run."

"Hiiee!?" Tsuna stared disbelievingly at Masami, clutching at his head in a panic. "You brought me to the yakuza hideout!?"

She probably wouldn't even have told him if the rusty gate they stood in front of him didn't have a huge sign:

STAY OUT OR DIE!

"Please stop shouting before you draw unnecessary attention," she requested, ignoring his crisis. "Sawada-san, if you would hide behind that wall over there until this dance is over. You're still a bit clumsy yet."

Tsuna didn't waste a second diving for the crumbling wall that Masami had pointed out, crying tears of despair at the path his life had led him towards. He was going to die today after all! It was what he deserved for making such a crazy friend!

Meanwhile, Masami frowned and tapped her closed fan against her lips for a moment. A light bulb seemed to light up above her head half a second later. "Aha. I knew I'd forgotten something."

Something as inane as forgetting could befall Masami?

Tsuna didn't believe it.

She pulled out her phone and dialed a number, expanding her black fan to cool herself absently...despite the fact that her breath was visible in the winter air. No, he didn't get her at all. "Greetings, Onii-san," she said.

Tsuna went as still as possible. It couldn't be. It was. Masami was talking to Hibari. The Hibari Kyoya. Well, Masami was a Hibari, too, but she was Masami and Kyoya was Hibari. Oh no, it was true, today was the day he would die! And he hadn't even written his will! Or confessed to Kyoko-chan!

"Outside the local yakuza hideout... They persist in being bothersome... I see. When you arrive, would you mind picking up my classmate? He'll be hiding out of sight... Thank you, Onii-san. I'll see you soon."

After putting her phone away, Masami gestured fleetingly towards Tsuna with her fan. "Please keep out of sight, Sawada-san. My brother will be here to supervise shortly."

"O-Oh." He breathed a sigh of relief, tense shoulders relaxing. No doubt Hibari would be able to take out the yakuza gang without blinking. "Don't worry, I'll just wait here with you until he gets here to take care of these guys — "

"If I may, what are you referring to?" She raised a dark eyebrow at him, turning back to face the fence. "Onii-san will be performing clean up. I will be the one to dance."

"W-What?!" Aghast, Tsuna gaped openly at her, wondering dimly if his ears were working right. Maybe he had misheard? "I'm s-sorry, but I could have sworn you just said you were going to take this gang on all by yourself."

"You did not misunderstand anything, Sawada-san." And though her words remained perfectly polite, for the first time ever, he saw a hint of bloodlust slip into her smile. It made him shiver. "This will be...a lovely promenade."

Then, before Tsuna could argue further or try to stop her, Masami vaulted easily over the gate and landed on the other side. A shot promptly rang through the air, breezing past her with only a fingertip to spare.

"Oi! Who the hell are you!?" came the shout, followed in seconds by stamping feet as the yakuza on watch raised the alarm.

Masami stepped forward fearlessly, swaying this way and that as more bullets were fired at her. Tsuna couldn't help being terrified even though he wasn't the one being shot at, but none of the bullets came close to hitting her. Warning shots? She didn't seem to hurry at all, but she was out of his line of sight all too quickly. And although his fingers were shaking and his breath was coming in rapid bursts, Tsuna forced himself to peek up over the wall to see what was going on. "Hieee!"

Masami stood in the middle of the clearing in front of the abandoned building, surrounded on all sides by yakuza.

This wasn't good! Where was Hibari!? What was Tsuna going to do!?

"Little girls aren't allowed here." The maybe-leader of the group, scarred and tattooed, stepped forward. "Get out and maybe we won't give you a lesson on wondering where you shouldn't fucking be!"

As Tsuna watched apprehensively, Masami withdrew her second fan from the sleeves of her kimono with a bow, holding one spread across her neck, partially obscuring her face, and the other parallel to the ground. She smiled, elegant and calm. "Greetings. Shall we dance?"

In some hidden corner of his mind, Tsuna admired how his friend's voice could come out so airy and pure, not a tremor to be heard. That didn't stop the rest of him from panicking on her behalf though. What was she doing? Was she trying to get herself killed!?

"Che, damn brats. Don't even have any common sense nowadays." The leader turned his back on Masami with that disgusted comment, waving a hand dismissively. "Well, I gave you the choice. Boys, fire!"

"W-Wait, Boss, I think that's — " One of his subordinates tried to cut in, but it was too late, the order had been given. About a dozen shots blasted out, and Tsuna opened his mouth to call out in a panic, despite knowing he could do nothing — 

But Masami was already moving.

"I-It's that damn Skylark's little sister, damn it!" the poor subordinate called out in a panic right before he was sent flying through the air by a blur of white and purple only to land hard on the concrete, foaming at the mouth.

"I apologize. Normally, I let my brother take care of things which is why you lot only know me by reputation..." Masami spared the time to inform the yakuza with faux sorrow. "But today will be an exception, I suppose."

And with that, she spun in a circle and flung six men back easily, sending them flying through the air in beautiful parabolic curves.

' ...I was an idiot,' Tsuna thought, feeling a little faint as he tracked the course of the battle, 'to think Masami-san would be scared of seven opponents.'  Right now, she was faring against a good two dozen with ease.

Dancing, she had always referred to battle as dancing. And now Tsuna could understand why. Every move that Masami executed was with such grace and poise that it was as if she was dancing with her opponents, a lethal, refined dance like none he'd ever seen before. In comparison, the men that she fought were clumsy, inexperienced: boys who had stumbled onto the dance floor for the first time in their lives, tripping over their own feet. None of them ever seemed to be able to so much as touch her, their efforts in pained vain.

One second, the fans in her hands acted as clubs, hitting the yakuza with enough force that some collapsed on the spot. The next, they cut like blades, spilling more blood than Tsuna had ever seen everywhere.

There was just no winning with her.

Masami danced her way through the opening number and right on into the hideout, leaving behind her a pile of limp bodies, red speckled on the gray concrete. Not long after that, loud screams and cries were audible again.

It was official, Tsuna decided. He was never, ever, ever going to make Masami mad again.

"Herbivore."

Tsuna squeaked and dropped from the wall to land hard on his butt, fumbling with his taser only to end up staring wide-eyed at the prefect that he hadn't heard arrive but was now staring coldly at him.

Hibari Kyoya looked just as frightening as the rumors made him out to be, his eyes the same shade as his sister's but so much more unforgiving. The uniform he wore was unfamiliar, but the pair of tonfa he held were all too much so.

"H-H-Hi-Hibari-san!" Tsuna croaked out at last, his heart having dropped into his stomach. There had been far too many surprises today — he would end up having a heart attack at this rate!

Hibari eyed him, plainly unimpressed. "So this is the herbivore my sister's been devoting her attention to for the past year? I should bite you to death right here right now for giving her so much trouble."

Tsuna almost choked on his own spit, waving his arms frantically in front of him as a means of detergent. "P-Please don't!" When Hibari didn't look convinced, he added, "M-Masami-san wouldn't be h-happy!" Or at least he hoped so. She wouldn't have wasted that much time on him if she wasn't somewhat emotionally invested, right? Tsuna didn't know; Masami was a mystery on a good day and never really talked about her feelings. Tsuna had never really had the courage to ask either.

"Hn." Hibari was interrupted of his contemplation on whether or not his sister would be too heartbroken if Tsuna died by a long, drawn-out scream of pain from the hideout. That seemed to decide him. "We will continue this later, herbivore."

Spinning on his heel with the unspoken order that Tsuna would follow, Hibari stalked to the gate and destroyed it with a single swing of his tonfa. He strolled casually through the wrecked courtyard, entirely relaxed in sharp contrast to the younger boy, who was near ghostly pale and feeling a little faint.

While the anxious Tsuna tried to go around the corp — bodies, bodies, they were still alive, they had to be alive — Hibari pointedly walked in a straight line with no regard to whatever or who ever he crushed under foot. Meaning a lot of broken, bloodied yakuza were stomped on with no regard to their wounds. Tsuna winced at the sobs the men let out at the further abuse to their bodies, but Hibari didn't even seem to notice, much less care.

Heading into the building also filled with defeated men, they were first ambushed when they turned a corner. Tsuna didn't even have time to warn Hibari before a brutal strike from a tonfa brought the man to his knees and a kick sent him flying into the wall.

Tsuna decided from there on out to wisely keep his mouth shut.

Hibari definitely didn't need his help...or want it.

As they moved forward, Tsuna couldn't help but notice how...differently Hibari moved in comparison to Masami even through the panicked shrieking in his head. It was weird; they were siblings, and thus, similar in the strangest of ways, but very different, too, all at the same time.

"You understand how various students have varied handwriting? Dancing is the same. People have different dance patterns. Some are clumsy, some are smooth. Others like fast melodies or slow lullabies. It depends on the individual."

Words Masami had spoken before when lecturing Tsuna on combat. Now, as he watched Hibari take down enemy after enemy, Tsuna suddenly found himself getting it.

Hibari was all savage ferocity and wild strength, easily striking down enemies and allies alike. He fought direct and efficient, not a single movement wasted. The battlefield was where he excelled, where he belonged. He reveled in the violence, was brutal, nearly fascinating in his intensity. His blunt force was almost beautiful in its own way, so long as you were far out of his way. It was a straight path from A to B once Hibari made up his mind, and everything in-between would be beaten into submission.

Masami, on the other hand, was motionless fluidity and shocking speed, quiet and sly. She struck fast and hard when needed, impossibly agile and nimble. Her precision was effortless, her grace stunning. She had turned fighting into a lovely art form, an expression of beauty and style. If there had been no enemies back in that courtyard and she had been alone, Tsuna would have assumed she was dancing in a style he wasn't familiar with, not moving through katas.

They were both combat, both melee, but they were very different.

Tsuna almost bumped into Hibari, distracted by his thoughts, and gulped at the death glare that was shot at him in retaliation. He hastily redirected his attention to the building in the hopes of living a while longer.

There were cracks running down the walls, a whole bunch of graffiti on them, too. 'You fucker!' one proclaimed in violent red, 'Piss off!' another defied, 'You're all shit!' the last one scolded. The floors were dusty and bloody, what little furniture there was old and creaky.

These yakuza were pretty sad, in Tsuna's humble opinion.

"Masami."

Oh. Tsuna looked up, realizing that while he had been lost in his thoughts, Hibari had defeated three more lackeys and reached the center of the base. Tentatively, Tsuna leaned to the side to peer beyond Hibari.

He gaped.

Masami sat daintily on a desk that must have been ancient, the room that they occupied completely wrecked. A man, the maybe-leader, was lying unconscious on the rug, blood dripping out of his mouth and eyes rolled back into his head.

Tsuna dearly hoped that he wasn't dead.

Masami's calm eyes came to rest on her brother after a searching glance at her classmate. She slid off the desk, kimono blood-free, to smile and bow shallowly, poise intact. "Greetings, Onii-san, Sawada-san."

Even in the midst of blood and ruin, Tsuna marveled at how she could somehow still manage to appear both composed and untouchable, like a heavenly harbinger of doom. He could see her contentedly reigning over the world after the apocalypse hit. He found that equally, if not more, terrifying than the fact that she'd effectively taken down an entire yakuza base on her own. There was no telling how dangerous she could be at any given time...because this was the way she always acted.

Yup. Never, ever, ever, ever upsetting Masami again.

"Are you satisfied?" Hibari asked, stepping forward. What a strange question. Wait, what was Tsuna thinking? This was The Hibari Kyoya. There was no common set of earthly rules he was willing to operate by.

"I did," Masami replied, that dangerous smile widening. Only one fan in sight — the white one that was mysteriously somehow still white — she waved it vaguely at the fallen yakuza between them. "Kusakabe-san will be informed?"

"Yes." Hibari put away his tonfa, retrieving a phone that looked identical to the one that his sister used. "Tetsuya. The raid is over... We are not injured... Yes, an ambulance will be needed...Don't you dare crowd..."

While the scary prefect was distracted, Tsuna crept over to Masami's side. "A-Are you alright, Masami-san?" He hadn't seen any injuries, but she was good at hiding things like that.

She directed a reassuring smile at him. "I'm fine, Sawada-san. Thank you for your concern. I assume there were no problems before Onii-san arrived?"

"Y-Yeah. Are the yakuza...are they — " He couldn't say it.

"They're alive. All of them."

"Oh." Tsuna breathed a sigh of relief. It was over, it was really over. Now that the fighting was gone and done with, he almost felt his legs give. Today had been an awful, awful day. He leaned against the desk so he wouldn't collapse.

Hibari's impression of him would definitely hit rock bottom if he did something like that. If it was even possible for it to sink lower than it already was anyway.

Masami looked thoughtfully at him for a moment before saying gently, "You need to get some rest, Sawada-san. Come with me, it's been a long day, hasn't it?" She began to glide out of the room, leaving things to her brother.

Tsuna nodded, scratching the back of his neck sheepishly as he followed her. "Yeah, sorry about that. It was all because of me that this happened, right?"

"Please don't fool yourself, Sawada-san," she disagreed without a hitch in her voice or stride. "This had nothing to do with you."

He froze, staring at her back. "Masami-san...?"

"This yakuza group has been a nuisance to the peace of Namimori for a very long time but never before have they dared to attack a student. They would have been disposed of sooner or later. I simply chose sooner," she elaborated without turning.

"O-Oh." Tsuna drooped, exhaustion and disappointment combining into a heavy weight that threatened to crush him into the ground. He'd known that cool, sophisticated Masami didn't consider him a close friend, but it still hurt.

He heard her sigh and then light fingers touched his chin, lifting his head up until their eyes locked. "Don't misunderstand me, Sawada-san," she said evenly. "Your training from before will look like a walk in the park after today. Should an incident like this repeat, I will not be so gracious."

Tsuna's eyes widened, torn helplessly between giddy happiness and cold terror. It was the first time, the first time ever that Masami had ever insinuated, however subtly, that he was more than just a piece of trash she had picked up off the street. He settled for grousing, "At least give me a day to rest, Masami-san."

She raised an eyebrow. "Absolutely not." Letting him go, Masami continued to navigate the twisted corridors with a confidence that he couldn't mirror. "As your defense is now satisfactory, we will move on to offense."

Tsuna shivered. Maybe he would have been better off if the Yakuza had gotten to him.

Later that day, Masami rested her elbows on the chabudai, resting her chin on her interlaced fingers. Two hours ago, she had escorted Tsunayoshi home, where his mother, Sawada Nana, had fussed over him and thanked her.

At the very least, she thought to herself, Nana obviously loved Tsunayoshi, even if her comments on her no-good son having such a wonderful friend were...concerning. His missing father...well. That was another issue. A more important one than she'd realized.

And here she'd thought this little side project of hers was going to be straightforward and simple.

"Masami." Kyoya padded into the room on silent feet. He sat down across from her in seiza, his silence a question. He wanted to know what was wrong.

"I persuaded an interesting piece of information from the yakuza leader," she said at last. "Regarding Sawada-san." It had shocked her at the time, though she had recovered by the time the boys arrived.

He grunted. "I do not see why you would associate with a herbivore like him, much less go on a rampage as you did. He is weak, not worth your time."

...a rampage, hmm? An applicable word for the ice that had flown through her veins, that freezing, ruthless state she had lived in not long ago. There had been very little mercy in her then. No one touched what was hers, a view shared by her brother.

Though, for Kyoya, there were only three things that he considered his. Himself, his family, and his home — Namimori.

Masami...was more fluid on that matter and far less possessive as a whole.

She sighed. "We've been through this more than once, Onii-san. I enjoy nurturing his potential."

Kyoya hummed and drank from the cup of tea she'd poured for him. "Continue."

"...do you remember Otou-san telling us about the CEDEF of Vongola?" The External Advisers of the Family of what was widely regarded as the most powerful Mafia Family in Italy.

He nodded and gave her a look that said she should get to the point.

"Sawada Tsunayoshi's father is the current leader of the CEDEF, Sawada Iemitsu." The one who had once, according to Tsunayoshi, sent home a postcard depicting penguins while claiming he was looking for oil. That one.

This time, there was blatant disbelief in Kyoya's voice. "That cowering herbivore has connections to the Vongola?"

"It seems so. Although...I don't believe Sawada-san knows himself." He considered himself ordinary, entirely ordinary. Which was totally ridiculous, seeing as Masami would pay not an iota of attention to someone ordinary.

"Hn." Kyoya braced his chin on his fist. "In that case, perhaps your decision is not as outrageous as I initially thought. Keep an eye on him."

Masami smiled and took a sip of tea. "Of course, Onii-san." And if his heritage was true, then Tsunayoshi was in quite a good amount of danger. More training was needed.

As she'd promised, the day after that, Tsunayoshi had to drag himself home, crying silently all the way. 'What did I do to deserve this!?'

Luckily for Tsunayoshi, the months that followed were less strenuous, mostly because Masami became distracted by the budding changes of puberty.

She had noticed before, of course, but had shelved the knowledge away in the hopes that things would stay the same. Sadly, simply because she had ignored puberty did not mean puberty had ignored her.

A month before her twelfth birthday, Masami observed the blood in her underwear with a scowl. How irksome. Thankfully, her brother had already left for patrol — she only occasionally joined in now, rather than constantly following him as before — so she wouldn't have to explain this to him.

Shaking her head, she went downstairs to call her mother. Rika would know what to do.

Unfortunately, Masami discovered that her period was a troublesome thing. The abdominal cramps were aggravating, the headaches and cravings were irritating, and her temper was on a fine edge.

Tsunayoshi was the first victim to go.

"Is there something wrong, Masami-san?" he asked one day during lunch, peering at her with big brown eyes.

Masami went motionless. How nice of him to be worried over her. Unfortunately, she wasn't in any mood to engage. "Twenty laps around the school please."

"Hiiee!?" Poor Tsunayoshi looked half-alarmed and half-concerned.

"Now. Please." The snap of her fan made consequences evident.

"Why is it always meeeeee!?" he screamed as he dashed off, leaving a trail of dust behind him.

Kyoko and Hana understood as only other girls could, keeping out of her way when she was particularly irked.

Tetsuya didn't. He was number two.

"Masami-san, there's been some trouble with the delinquents."

"And my brother, Kusakabe-san?" This was his self-appointed job. She had no interest in managing a Territory.

Tetsuya inched away, evidently sensing that something was wrong even if he couldn't pinpoint the exact problem. "He did not want to perform the task..."

Masami smiled sharply, too restless to pretend civility. "I do not either."

He winced, taking a step towards the door. "Masami-san, please."

"Kusakabe-san?"

"...yes?"

"Please leave."

"H-Hai."

Tetsuya hastily retreated, swallowing hard. Even he had limits to his bravery.

The third and inevitable victim was Kyoya.

"Onii-san." Masami leaned against the wall outside of his office.

Kyoya looked up at that tone of voice and found a sister just a little too angry for his tastes. "What?"

"Deal with your delinquents."

He examined the current level of danger. "...or?"

"And buy me a box of chocolate." Turning on her heel, Masami glided out.

By night, there was a box of chocolate on the dinner table and a group of delinquents in the hospital.

In return, Masami very considerately didn't poison her brother's ramen.

After her time of the month had passed, leaving the males in her life to breathe a silent sigh of relief, even if they weren't quite sure what had been wrong, she stood before the bathroom mirror and stared at her reflection. Her clothes hadn't been fitting quite right recently, and this was why. She was, hmm, developing in the chest area.

...time to call Rika again.

Needless to say, Kyoya did not agree to go shopping with her that week. Not that he normally did, but there was an extra dot of vehemence this week. He didn't know what she was looking for, but male intuition said he should keep out of it.

Masami resisted the urge to roll her eyes and brought Kyoko and Hana along. They consented cheerfully and made several stylish suggestions. She knew there was a reason she kept them around.

Thankfully for Kyoya, Masami found the boys in her class, in her entire school really, to be uninteresting and unworthy of a crush. That would have been disastrous on so many levels, especially for the poor, undeserving boy involved.

Unfortunately for Masami, this particular effect was not replicated for her, and she had to deal with hormone-ridden boys making eyes at her. Her retaliation came in the form of conduct colder than the ninth layer of hell. They were lucky Kyoya was away at middle school.

Eventually, after his sister's fifth period and the subsequent mine-filled week, said brother sighed and finally gave in. "Do not wreck my motorcycle, Masami," he warned sternly.

Masami looked over the sleek, black machine with eyes that glinted darkly in satisfaction. "No worries, Onii-san. I'll make sure to take good care of your baby."

Kyoya shot a comparatively mild glare at her before stalking away, throwing the keys in the air. Masami caught it with ease and began fiddling with the motorcycle.

Oh, this would be fun.

Three weeks before graduation, Tsuna was walking to school when a faint zoom caught his attention. He frowned, turning slightly to the side. "Eeh? It...sounds like...a car...?" Except cars normally didn't come onto this small road.

In the distance, a cloud of dust rose into the air, a figure coming closer...coming closer at a very high speed. "Hiiieee!" Throwing himself to the side in hopes of not getting rolled over, Tsuna put his bag on the ground and hoped he wouldn't have to fight.

If he lost, Masami would flat-out kill him this time. Literally, there was no chance he would come out with his heart still beating.

As the gap between him and the approaching silhouette was eaten up, Tsuna managed to make out some details. Long dark hair flying in the air, an elementary school uniform, two spinning wheels...

Tsuna's eyes popped out as the motorcycle sped past him and turned sharply, shrieking to a halt. A heeled boot came down to steady the rider.

"M-M-MASAMI-SAN?!" Tsuna shouted incredulously, feeling like running back to bed and diving under the covers. What was going on?!

His classmate glanced at him with a peaceful smile, as if she hadn't just come flying in on a motorcycle — a motorcycle! — saying, "Greetings, Sawada-san," complete with her usual bow.

"G-Good morning!" Tsuna managed to spit out, echoing the bow because to do otherwise was to cause even more trouble. "Er, uh, what's with the motorcycle — !?"

"Oh, this?" Tone as casual as if they were talking about the weather, Masami laid a tender hand on the gleaming flank of the vehicle. "It's Onii-san's. I'm borrowing it until graduation."

All color leached out of Tsuna's face. "Y-You mean you're going to come to school every day...like this?! And where's your helmet!?" How was this legal? What had he done in his past life to deserve this? H-Had he been a yakuza or something!?

Unbeknownst to Tsuna, he wasn't that far off the mark.

"That is correct. Helmets are uncomfortable and unnecessary, and I'm sure you'll agree with me when I say I don't need them." Masami paused to tilt her head at a horrified Tsuna. "Would you like a ride, Sawada-san?"

Tsuna ran off into the sunrise, crying loudly, arms flailing. "HIIIIIEEEEEE!"

And thus, in no time at all, they graduated from Namimori Elementary and entered Namimori Middle.

Then, things started to get interesting.

Chapter Text

Basse: an Italian courtly dance for couples, with a style of small gliding steps and various combinations of small bows in 12/8 time.

The summer after graduation, Kyoya decided that it was finally time for his little sister to join his Disciplinary Committee, seeing as she would shortly thereafter be attending Namimori Middle.

Accordingly, he informed Tetsuya that all members were to be gathered in the gym tomorrow morning while he went off to find Masami. Everyone else might be off crowding during break, but there were still herbivores at remedial school in Namimori that he had to herd.

Granted, even if there hadn't been that, Kyoya would still have been busy patrolling the streets and keeping the sheep safe, but as it was, he was dismally occupied with stupid herbivores who couldn't use the soft matter in their skulls.

At least there was time for him to nap on the rooftop.

Tracking Masami down to her favorite bookstore, he found her seated at a corner table, her glasses perched on her nose and eyes set firmly on the book of politics she was reading at the moment, a cup of coffee and a half-eaten muffin by her hand.

Sometimes Kyoya's sister acted too much like a studious herbivore for his liking. It wasn't as if she didn't have one of the highest grades in her year.

(All the same, as soon as he entered the store, Masami's eyes darted up, her position shifting to allow for free movement, a fan suddenly innocuously tapping against the table.)

But, he smirked, it didn't truly matter because she was a carnivore at heart, as was expected of a Hibari, even if she liked playing a harmless piranha in the school of fish for her own amusement.

"Greetings, Onii-san," she said with a soft smile and a dip of her head. "What brings you here?"

Kyoya hardly enjoyed visiting bookstores. "Hn. You will join the Disciplinary Committee tomorrow in the gym of Namimori Middle at the break of dawn." It came out as more of a statement than a question.

There was a beat of silence as she considered. He waited for her to agree, not patiently but not impatiently either, because, for all that his sister didn't much appreciate responsibility outside of what she chose for herself, she would concede if he asked.

"?Hmm...alright," she said finally, with an almost convincingly light tone. "How are the novices doing? Have they caught up to your standards yet"

He grunted disdainfully, sitting down in a free chair across from her. "No, they remain pathetic herbivores. You can start remedial training with them later."

Masami was far more patient than Kyoya was — she could endure the sad state of his subordinates long enough to drill some backbone into them. And, more importantly, she actually liked making something worth looking at of weak herbivores. Since childhood, whether it was embroidery or flower arrangements, Masami was the type of person who delighted in taking something and making it more.

Of course, it wasn't until she had found Sawada Tsunayoshi that she'd added herbivores to her list of projects. Kyoya still wasn't sure what was so special about that ridiculously fluffy herbivore, but it wasn't his time that was being wasted.

If she thought she could make a carnivore out of a herbivore, then he would watch her try.

"Hai, hai," Masami said despite the well-hidden whisper of hesitation in her eyes. "Well, I'm sure tomorrow will be a very interesting day."

Tetsuya closed the door behind him and observed the men in uniform, lined up in ranks along the wall, with pitying eyes, which he carefully concealed behind professionalism. These poor prefects were going to get a shock today but hopefully they would live through it.

What didn't kill you made you stronger, right?

Or maybe it was what didn't kill you went after you with a pair of tonfa and bit you to death.

Something like that. Maybe his time with the Hibari Siblings had distorted his view of the world a bit. Just a bit.

Striding out to stand in front of them, Tetsuya noted the military posture and stoic faces with a nod of approval. Maybe they would survive after all. Then again, this was Hibari Masami, and there was just no predicting her.

"Men," he started out, clasping his hands behind his back, "I have called you here today so that we can meet the newest member of the Disciplinary Committee of Namimori Middle School."

No murmurs, no whispers, though there were a few glances here and there. Good. They were learning self-control. Kyoya expected no less and would accept no less.

"If I may introduce..." He turned dramatically towards the closed doors of the gym. "...Masami."

Right on cue, the door was pushed open and a familiar girl glided in, her expression mostly covered by her fan. But Tetsuya — and probably only Tetsuya, seeing as Kyoya wasn't here yet — could see the laughter in that veiled gaze as Masami took in the gobsmacked looks on his subordinates' faces. He knew what they were seeing: a petite girl with flowers in her hair, waving around a delicate fan, and dressed in a deep blue yukata, looking so innocent and sweet.

A little angel, really.

Finally, one of the veterans in the group, Yachi, deigned to speak up, his face so blank it only served to frame the disbelief in his voice. "T-This is our new recruit, Kusakabe-sempai?"

Her laughter chimed in the air as she stepped forward to stand beside Tetsuya and bowed. "Yes. Greetings, everyone. Please take good care of me."

Tetsuya and Masami were then promptly treated to the amusing show of a dozen hardcore former-delinquents, still halfway reformed and baring the scars of their previous life, gaping at them openly with their heads tilted to the side, question marks hanging over them.

The second-in-command coughed awkwardly into his fist when the silence stretched out a bit too long and hustled the prefects away from more staring before Kyoya busted through the door and bit them all to death for disrespecting his sister.

Not that the men here currently knew that.

"Ahem. Alright, Ibu, Kamisaka, and Tsuga, get up here." He pointed at the individuals as he singled them out, all relatively new and certain to underestimate their new associate. "Spar with Masami." Tetsuya inwardly winced at his own disrespect but it was for the greater good, he assured himself.

Besides, Masami herself had agreed to the ruse, if only because it meant she got to have some fun with her unfortunate dancing partners. Kyoya was a different matter, but he couldn't know, could he?

Tetsuya swallowed and decided not to push his luck.

"Eeeh?" Kamisaka, a decent fellow all things considered if a bit chauvinistic, scratched at his hair. "You sure, sempai? All three of us? I mean, she is new and all..."

"Yeah, she wouldn't last a second...no offense or anything," Tsuga tacked on sheepishly with an apologetic glance at the girl in question, who merely hid her thoughts behind her fan.

Ibu didn't say anything but arched his eyebrows and looked Masami up and down with poorly concealed skepticism. If nothing else, he was certainly going to receive an education today.

"No talking back," Tetsuya reprimanded. "Get up here."

The three boys grumbled and groused but broke formation to surround Masami as Tetsuya backed off. She snapped her fan shut and smiled, honey-sweet, stashing her inconspicuous weapon away so quickly no one was quite sure where it went.

"Hey," Kamisaka said, raising his hands with a pacifying grin. "No hard feelings, alright? Think of it as hazing."

"Shut up," Tsuga muttered to his friend from the corner of his mouth. "That's not reassuring."

"We'll go easy on you," Ibu conceded, smiling faintly at the girl in an attempt to comfort her.

Masami simply covered her giggle with her hand as if by habit, eyes sparkling playfully. "Shall we dance then?"

While the three were preoccupied with looking stupid by standing there in confusion, Tetsuya snorted and called out, "Start!" The wretched boys wouldn't know what had hit them.

And, of course, he was proven right.

Kamisaka moved first, the hotheaded fool, rushing in with a fist cocked back and visible hesitation in his stance. He obviously didn't want to hit the pretty, dainty girl too hard, afraid of breaking her.

Sadly for him, she had no similar reservations. As soon as he was within range, Masami weaved under the punch and swept his legs out from under him, sending him sprawling to the floor with a wide-eyed gasp.

Before Tsuga or Ibu had even had a chance to recover from their surprise, she was on them, not giving them so much as a second to process the startling turn of events. A flip of her arm sent Tsuga off to join his friend on the ground and a strike to Ibu's solar plexus brought him down as well.

As fights went, this one was woefully anti-climatic. It had taken a total of around ten seconds.

The silence in the gym echoed. For a brief moment, Tetsuya reveled in the quiet. The Hibari Siblings were very good at causing it, he noted wryly.

Tetsuya looked at the remaining men with a purposefully bland face, noting their pale, sweaty faces with well-hidden amusement. "Any other objections to Masami?" he demanded.

"No, sir," came the unified reply as the prefects stared at the previously harmless-looking girl with an approriate (but still not enough) amount of nerves, fear, and awe. Well, they would learn.

"Good. Now, Yachi, Arishima, Odaka, you're up."

Approximately five minutes later, every single prefect, barring Tetsuya, was lying flat on their backs on the hard floor, staring distantly at the bright lights. They must have been quite captivating.

Standing right smack in the middle, Masami's serene smile had never faltered. "Perhaps a bit more practice before stepping on the dance floor again?" was all she murmured, her fan showing up out of nowhere to air herself, casually taking no notice of the wrecked ego her every victim now sported.

"Wao. Masami, I see you've been having fun." A familiar, amused voice spoke up from the door, prompting the prefects to stiffen and haul themselves to their feet to salute at light-speed.

Tetsuya himself blinked and almost jumped out of his skin despite his extensive experience regarding this very scenario. Really, they were like cats. "Kyoya-san!"

Leaning against the door frame from where he had been watching for who-knows-how-long, the Head of the Disciplinary Committee looked somewhat sleepy.

He'd probably been taking a nap then.

Cats.

Meanwhile, Masami brightened and flowed airily around the tall, intimidating men she had just beaten into the ground to bow to Kyoya with a faint smile. "Greetings, Onii-san."

A shocked kind of horror filled the face of every prefect in sight, their muscles locking together to prevent any kind of unknown movement in the devastating situation they now found themselves in. As if by staying still, they could avoid the attention of the two "carnivores" in the room. Tetsuya swallowed down his laughter.

"...'Onii-san'...?" Okada repeated in a whisper, swaying slightly on his feet. He looked a tad green.

Ibu gulped, licking his lips. "President...then she is...?"

"What." Yachi's voice was impressively monotone.

"Ah, I suppose I forgot to mention," Tetsuya said, feigning innocence as much as he was able to, although he wasn't nearly as skilled as Masami. "Masami-san's full name is Hibari Masami, and she is Kyoya-san's younger sister by two years. My bad."

Kamisaka, who had only just recovered from his beating, fell back, eyes rolling into the back of his head, and fainted like an innocent maiden exposed to blood for the very first time.

Tsuga quickly chose to follow his friend's example.

The look Kyoya saw fit to give them all was blatantly unimpressed. "Enough crowding," he said, tonfa appearing in hand. "Or I'll bite you all to death."

The prefects obligingly scattered before the wrath of the Skylark could strike, Ibu frantically dragging Kamisaka and Tsuga's bodies out of the gym with the help of considerate Arishima.

"Hmm." Masami blew out a breath slowly and laughed. "That went...well."

After that, Masami's induction into the Disciplinary Committee went quite smoothly, her position as Kyoya's new left-hand accepted with no fuss. No prefect had the guts to argue against their President...plus, she had kicked their asses, and they all knew it. Strength was respect in their group, a philosophy that had most likely originated unwittingly from Kyoya. After getting over the shock that their revered President had a sister — and why hadn't they heard about this before!? — no prefect had denied that Masami was more than suitable for the position she'd been given.

It wasn't as if Kyoya would have listened to any protests anyway, much less any that were disrespectful to his sister. He would have just bitten the herbivore to death and gone on to do exactly what he'd planned. That was simply the way their Boss was.

As the self-proclaimed third-in-command — even though Tetsuya deferred to her — Masami easily took charge of the paperwork, filing, information gathering, and other formalities. She was the one who went around sorting all the regular reports they received into something coherent and then passing it to Kyoya.

Unknown to the prefects, the siblings were actually somewhat surprised by how fast she took to the desk work. When questioned by Kyoya, Masami had merely shrugged and said that it seemed straightforward and easy to her. He'd nodded and promptly redirected the majority of his work to her. She'd accepted with a smile and a raised eyebrow. Needless to say, that week, the motorcycle was hers and their meals consisted of far too much dango for sanity's sake.

Masami's most important unofficial job was probably keeping Kyoya happy though. She was well aware of how the President's mind worked and how he liked things. There had been a decent decrease in violent incidents caused by Kyoya with the addition of coffee, hamburger steaks, and chocolate in the office.

(Actually, the general consensus among the prefects was that the last one was for the girl herself, especially after a long day of bending over stacks and stacks of forms, but no one was foolish enough to say that out loud.)

As the pseudo accountant/manager/diplomat, Masami kept things moving and acted as the polite, well-received buffer between the prefects and authorities, while Tetsuya dealt with the student body and all of their problems. It was a good working relationship, all things considered. The school population was certainly pleased and relieved.

But the first round of business that Kyoya assigned to Masami was to train the prefects. Correctly. And if any of them had any delusions about their new superior being kinder than the President because she looked like it, none of those delusions survived their first training — torture — session.

Oh, the worst of ironies for this evil princess to be called an angel by the school staff and considered a sweet, respectful girl by the majority of the town.

(Not that it could be said the prefects of Namimori didn't like Hibari Masami. As with the President and Kusakabe-sempai, she had their loyalty and respect. It just so happened that Masami was unpredictable and held enough sway in their lives that they were also wholly terrified.)

"Masami-sama!" Kamisaka cried as he collapsed to the floor. "Forgive me, but I can't go on anymore!"

"That's great, Kamisaka-san!" Masami clapped her hands lightly, smile soft. "Forty more push-ups, please."

Had the prefects interacted with Sawada Tsunayoshi, they would have immediately bonded with the fluffy boy over shared trauma at the hands of their so-called "trainer".

The very first thing Masami did when she stepped foot into Namimori Middle was establish her place in Kyoya's Discipline Committee. It went well, as she'd expected, so she crossed that off of her list.

The second thing Masami did was scout out the school. She walked down every hallway, peered discreetly through every classroom, and explored every nook and cranny. By lunch, she had a perfect mental blueprint of the building, along with certain renovations that could be useful later on.

If there had been anyone with the intention of reminding her that this was against the rules, as school hadn't yet started, her new uniform had very nicely cut them off.

Since the Disciplinary Committee had been originally composed of all male members, there hadn't been a female uniform before her arrival, meaning Masami was free to decide what she wanted to wear so long as Kyoya approved in the end. And Kyoya, to put it bluntly, Did Not Care.

So, in accordance with what she liked and some input from Kyoko and Hana, Masami had eventually decided on a white blouse with a black tie, a black pleated skirt, knee-high black socks, and black heeled boots. It was suitably comfortable and professional.

School started not long after. It had been drilled into her from childhood that first impressions were important. As such, Masami went to all of her classes on the first week of school and firmly reinforced the idea of the perfect, angelic student with impeccable manners and top grades. After that, it would be up to her whether or not she needed to attend a particular class. She still did for most of them, since education was important and she could always complete her duties before and after school, but she quite enjoyed the ability to choose.

The third thing Masami did was reject a male student. Which...pardon?

Not long after the beginning of the school year, she was confessed to for the first, but sadly not the last, time. Thankfully, it was in private, as she didn't know how she would have reacted to a public declaration — it would have been bad — but it remained a highly disturbing event.

She couldn't fathom what that boy had been thinking.

With the firm resolution to never allow Kyoya to hear a peep of the incident, Masami set off to find Kyoko and Hana for some explanations and advice. At the very least, Kyoko was the school's new idol, so she should know how to deal with such things, Masami reasoned.

"Hmm? Masa-chan, is something wrong?" Kyoko asked with a kind smile when the new prefect joined the two over lunch, discreetly scaring away all their other friends with a cool look. She tolerated the nickname; it wasn't so bad.

"An unfamiliar boy came up to me yesterday and confessed his undying devotion," Masami deadpanned with a shake of her head. "I'm afraid I simply don't understand, Sasagawa-san. I've never even talked to him before."

"Tch, hormonal teenage boys with crushes aren't really logical, Masa," Hana pointed out, rolling her eyes. "You turned him down, right?" Nothing less would fit with her sky high standards.

"Yes, I did," Masami said instantly. Granted, she had been polite but still. "Higashi-san would never have survived Onii-san." The boy had run off crying but that was still a much more preferable outcome than the bloody homicide that would have occurred if Kyoya found out. Which he wouldn't. Ever.

"Good girl." Hana nodded approvingly, picking at her soba. "But, I gotta say, he probably isn't the only one with a massive crush on you. If you acted just a little bit nicer, half of the stupid monkeys in our class would be fighting over you."

Masami stared at her in horror. "...please tell me you're joking." That much attention would be terribly stifling, crowding as Kyoya would say. She wasn't even interested in any of the fumbling boys in their school. Most of them couldn't carry a decent conversation with her for more than five minutes.

Hana smirked. "Sorry, but no. That outfit of yours makes you stand out and you're one of the prettiest girls in our grade. Boys like to think you're playing hard to get so that only encourages them. The only reason most of them haven't approached you before is because of that brother of yours."

Face blank, Masami turned to Kyoko, who had been listening to the conversation with an amused smile. "Is this true, Sasagawa-san?"

Kyoko winced, looking slightly apologetic despite all three of them knowing she had her own personal fan club. "Ah...hai, Masa-chan. I would just ignore it if I were you. I mean, if someone confesses to you and you don't like him, just turn him down nicely. It's not so bad. Really."

Masami arched an eyebrow. Was it honestly that simple? She found the very idea of confessions at this age disconcerting. They were in middle school. And she was only a first-year for that matter.

"Besides, your freak of a brother has a bigger fan club." Hana snorted.

"... what."

Three months into the school year and Masami was finally back in her favorite bookstore, watching Tsunayoshi run by on his daily training every so often through the window. She had been none too happy to find out he'd grown lazy during her absence in the summer and doubled his training regimen as punishment.

"Masami-san...I'm...done..."

She glanced up as he dragged himself into the bookstore, sweaty and breathless, the rest of the regulars so used to their antics that they carried on with their business without missing a beat. "Sawada-san. Good job."

Tsunayoshi grinned tiredly, a sparkle of satisfaction in his eyes. Masami didn't withhold compliments like some teachers did, but neither did she withhold criticism, and she knew he basked in the few times she expressed her approval. He defintely wasn't getting that kind of positive affirmation from his mother.

"Please feel free to return home," Masami offered, turning a page in her book of French history.

"Hiieee?" Tsunayoshi furrowed his brow, frowning. "But, Masami-san, you never let me go with just this amount of torture."

"Take the opportunity if it is offered," she lectured gently, unperturbed by his reference to her training methods. "Go home and rest."

Still looking confused, Tsunayoshi nodded and bade her goodbye, looking briefly at the sky with worry before jogging back home.

Masami rubbed her upper arms absently and observed the darkened sky as well, thoughtful and reflective. "A storm's coming..." she murmured to herself, taking a sip of chamomile tea. Her eyes flickered to the road for a moment, before she pulled her attention back to her book.

Naturally, the next day, Tsunayoshi didn't come to school.

Tsuna was...happy.

He wasn't Dame anymore, he had a (sorta) friend, and he was good enough to actually spar with said friend for five minutes without being knocked back into the dirt when she went easy on him (which was always). His grades were okay, he could pass the ball more often than not in gym, and his mother's smile could outshine the sun.

Sure, now that Masami was a prefect, sometimes she had to cut their lunches together short and maybe she had been distracted lately and she didn't always come to class either, but he stayed firm in his belief that there was no way he had earned enough bad karma for this.

"Ciaossu. I arrived three hours early, but as a service, I'll evaluate you now."

"Hey, whose kid are you?"

"Hm? I'm Reborn, the home tutor."

Tsuna stared at the fedora-wearing, dark-eyed, suitcase-toting baby on his doorstep and unwittingly shivered. He had no idea what was going on — why had his mom answered the flyer anyway? His grades had improved nicely over the years, thank you very much, must have been because it was free — but this...this aura, this feeling was familiar.

Sadly.

This was no regular baby, Tsuna decided immediately. Somehow, despite the fact that there was no resemblance at all, this... Reborn reminded him of Masami. Not ordinary, chilly polite, sweetly distant Masami, but the Hibari Masami who had destroyed a yakuza base by herself in under an hour.

Dangerous, he thought.

"Oh, my!" Nana exclaimed when Tsuna did nothing but stare blankly at his new so-called tutor. "What do you think, Tsu-kun?"

"...I don't need a tutor," Tsuna said at last when the baby turned pitch black eyes on him.

"So, you're Tsuna," Reborn said.

"Yeah, thanks for coming, but it's not nec — Hiiee!" Instincts taking over, Tsuna veered back just as a small foot would have kicked him in the stomach. Tsuna gaped at the baby — that would have been painful! "What was that for?!"

Reborn treated him to a pensive look that looked entirely out of place on a baby's face. "Looks like you're not as useless as I expected," he commented blandly. "Come on, we're talking in your room, Dame-Tsuna."

"How do you even know that nickname?!" Tsuna questioned while he struggled to keep up with Reborn as the baby climbed the steps confidently. No one had dared to call him that since that time Masami had directed her patented cease-and-desist smile at the first thoughtless bully who had done so within her hearing back in elementary school. "Who the heck are you anyways?!"

"I told you, I'm Reborn, your tutor." The baby stopped in the middle of Tsuna's bedroom and smirked, snapping open his suitcase to reveal parts of a gun, one that he quickly put together. "But my true line of work is assassination."

Tsuna regularly spent time with Masami, the acknowledged 'Angel' of Namimori Middle. His one and only friend was also the little sister of Hibari, the President of the Disciplinary Committee. As such, he was more than used to violent, strange, traumatizing proceedings.

But... "Assassination," he repeated flatly. Tsuna had to admit this took the cake. And maybe the six-course dinner.

Reborn nodded, turning the gun to aim at Tsuna. "My real job is to make you a mafia boss."

Tsuna froze for a long second, heart sinking.

His first coherent thought was, 'Masami-san is going to kill me.'

His second coherent thought was, 'What is it with the gun!?' 

His third coherent thought was, 'No way in hell. Or out of it.'

"What are you talking about?!" he demanded with a scowl.

The self-proclaimed hitman only blinked at him. "I was assigned by a certain man to train you to become an astounding Mafia Boss."

"Wait, wait, wait. Hold up!" Tsuna waved his hands in front of him in the time-out gesture. "Who's this 'certain man'? Mafia Boss of what? Who are you!?"

"The 'who' isn't important right now," Reborn told him. "You're going to be the Vongola Decimo, the head of the largest, most powerful Family of Italy. And I'm the home tutor who's going to get you there."

Tsuna narrowed his eyes and shook his head firmly. He didn't care how dangerous this baby was or what he might do. His life had finally been going his way for once, and he didn't have any intention of letting some stranger change that. "Nu-uh. I'm sorry, but I'm not going to become a Mafia Boss and nothing you say or do is going to change that."

"We'll see," was all that Reborn said ominously.

Masami heard the rumors first.

"Did you heard? Sawada..."

"He confessed to Kyoko-chan!"

"In his boxers!"

"I hear Mochida-senpai's angry!"

"Well, of course! How could Sawada touch our idol?!"

"Do you think there'll be a fight?"

"I guess he's Dame after all."

"For the crime of crowding, I'll bite you all to death."

"EEEEKKK, WE'RE SO SORRY, HIBARI-SAN!"

Masami paused and pursed her lips as Kyoya went after the chattering gossipers. She had known of Tsunayoshi's crush on Kyoko for a long time, but for him to act on it was unusual for the boy she'd met with yesterday. Much less in a haggard state of undress. She liked to think she'd taught him better than that.

Tilting her head, Masami tracked down Kyoko for the real story. "Greetings, Sasagawa-san," she said when she found her friend in an empty corridor, bowing shallowly.

Kyoko smiled brightly, turning to face her. "Masa-chan! Good morning! Is there something wrong? I thought you had to do your disciplinary duties in the morning."

In the afternoon and night, too, but that wasn't the point. "Well, I've been hearing some rumors, so would you please clarify them for me?" Masami asked.

"Ah..." Kyoko blinked, frowned pensively. "Is this about Tsuna-kun?"

"Yes. If it's not too uncomfortable, would you please recount your experience?" Moving to lean against the window, Masami glanced past the glass absently, taking in the crowds her brother would doubtlessly destroy in a few minutes.

"Alright!" she agreed easily, scrunching up her face in thought. "Let's see...when I was walking to school this morning, I caught a glimpse of Tsuna-kun and the cute baby following him around."

"Cute baby?" Tsunayoshi was an only child, as far as Masami knew.

"Mm-hm. I think his name was Reborn." Kyoko giggled. "He was playing at being in the mafia. It was so adorable!"

"I see." Masami was near certain she had heard the name "Reborn" somewhere, but she would take care of that later. Any mention of the Mafia, with Tsunayoshi's heritage, was most likely actually true. How troublesome.

"Right, so, after that, Tsuna-kun came running in from out of nowhere and asked me to go out with him. It was really weird," Kyoko recounted, frowning a bit. "He was only in his underwear. He never acts like that in class."

Masami narrowed her eyes. Strange behavior, strange baby, strange appearance. Hmm. "Perhaps he was simply out of sorts today," she offered. "Sick...or possibly delirious."

"You think so?" Kyoko perked up, looking relieved.

"I'll ask him later," Masami promised, adjusting her skirt. "The bell's going to ring soon, so I'll see you later, alright, Sasagawa-san? Thank you for telling me about your day."

"Aww, it was no problem, Masa-chan!" Beaming, Kyoko went off to her first class of the day, waving enthusiastically at Masami until she turned the corner and met up with Hana.

Masami waved back and proceeded to quietly excuse herself from class to place a phone call on the rooftop.

"Greetings, Otou-san." It had been five months since she had last talked to her father.

"Masami. What is it?" Satoshi's voice came out deep and calm, as familiar as ever.

"What do you know about a baby named 'Reborn?'"

There was a tense pause. "Reborn, you say?"

"Hai."

"Reborn is the The World's Strongest Hitman, also known as the Sun Arcobaleno."

Masami blinked. "...like Fon-san?"

"Yes."

She thought about why a hitman would be in Tsunayoshi's company. "Would he be allied to any particular Mafia Family?"

"He's a freelance hitman, but he has strong connections with the Vongola."

Well. Masami fiddled with her gunsen absently, closing her eyes in contemplation. "I see. Thank you, Otou-san."

"Be careful, Masami. Reborn is not someone you want to mess around with." Satoshi didn't ask what she was doing asking about the infamous hitman in the first place to her gratitude.

"I will." Flipping her phone shut, she turned to face her brother, who was leaning against the wall behind her, waiting. "A carnivore's in town."

That got Kyoya's attention. "Tell me more."

She told him, and when she was done, mentioned, "I'll probably be late to school tomorrow. Apologies."

Kyoya nodded curtly and turned to leave. "The baby's my opponent, Masami."

"Wait," Masami requested, looking up at the sky. It was clear today, bright blue and filled with light. "Just until I know what's going on, please."

"...fine." Disappearing down the stairs, Kyoya made off to patrol the hallways, Masami right behind him in her quest to tackle the paperwork. Today would be long and boring.

Not that it could possibly compensate for the chaos that would doubtlessly follow.

Sawada Tsunayoshi wasn't at all what Reborn had been expecting. 

Wimpy, pathetic, stupid, and a Dame to the core had been what the reports said. Iemitsu had been of the opinion his "tunafishie" was shy, fluffy, and cute. To turn this boy into a proper Mafia Boss, the spies had concluded, would take a miracle. 

Reborn made a note to tear apart and then fire those same spies later. They were clearly deluded and incompetent. As for the boy's missing, idiotic father, well...Iemitsu would need a more...specialized kind of punishment.

Even if the reports had been right once upon a time, Tsunayoshi had changed. For one, Tsuna had been more wary than disbelieving when meeting a baby hitman, perceptive to the point that he had noticed that Reborn was no ordinary infant right away. His grades were decently above average, a noticeable increase starting from fifth grade, according to the school records. His reflexes were far better than anticipated — the brat had even been able to dodge some of the shots Reborn had fired at him, purely on instinct.

It could be the Hyper Intuition acting up, but just because the mind knew didn't mean the body could follow. Tsuna wasn't in any clubs or sports, so either he exercised for some unknown reason or he'd been through some sort of training.

More than all of that, he'd had the nerve to argue against Reborn even with a gun pointed in his face, conviction aglow in his orange-tinted eyes, face mulishly-set, that no, he wasn't going to be a Mafia Boss no matter what, and that was that.

Not that Reborn would listen to Tsuna in truth — it was his mission and he didn't fail missions — but it was a little impressive nonetheless.

Sawada Tsunayoshi wasn't quite the useless, helpless idiot that Reborn had been led to believe he was.

"Hieeee! How am I going to face Kyoko-chan today?!" Tsuna gripped at his head, tugging at his hair violently.

But he was still an idiot. Apparently, that impressive Will only showed up when someone was threatening to drown his future in blood and crime. Shame. "Hiding is not Mafia Boss Behavior."

"I told you, I don't want to be a Mafia Boss! And I'm not going to hide either!"

"Greetings, Sawada-san." The cool alto voice came directly from behind Tsuna.

"Hiiieeeee!" He jumped into the air, clearly caught by surprise (which Reborn would have to train out of him), and whirled around. "Masami-san!"

Unconcerned, Reborn turned to face the newcomer as well, having sensed the other's presence a minute ago. Few professionals could hide from the World's Greatest Hitman. A middle school student wasn't exactly a challenge.

Hibari Masami stared down at him, dressed in a formal black and white outfit that didn't match Namimori Middle's uniform. She held herself with an air of dignity, her fan — a gunsen, the "decorations" capable of slicing a man into shreds — hiding the bottom half of her face. Reborn identified her as Tsuna's sole friend, a well-liked girl with a seemingly flawless record. A member of the Disciplinary Committee, her grades were excellent, her composure unruffled.

An ordinary civilian with a bright, lawful future ahead of her, untouched by the darker aspects of her Family's activities...or so it seemed.

It was a good thing Reborn only believed what he saw with his own two eyes.

Because this girl was trained in reconnaissance, in observation. Her eyes were too sharp, her steps too soft, her bearing too confident. Her frame was slender, but her muscles were strong, conditioned from strenuous use. She was too poised, too still. This wasn't the look of an innocent from a family of assassins and killers, power and justice, men of steel and women of blades. This wasn't the look of a civilian looking forward to becoming a veterinarian or something.

Not bad. It looked like Tsuna had already drawn in a fascinating individual. He wondered if she had any Flame Potential.

"And your companion happens to be...?" Masami inquired, eyes flicking momentarily to his student...who had straightened up from his slouch, as if the girl's mere presence had been enough to insert a little more backbone into the boy. Interesting.

"Ciaossu," Reborn chirped without giving Tsuna time to say anything. "I am Reborn, the Vongola Hitman and Dame-Tsuna's home tutor."

'Now...how will Hibari Masami react?' he thought to himself, tuning out Tsuna's horrified stare. 'Will she dismiss me as a child playing pretend as normal people do or...?'

"Is that so?" Masami bowed, smiling faintly. "Greetings, my name is Hibari Masami. Please take good care of me."

Not a trace of disbelief or indulgence, Reborn noted, dipping his fedora in return. She'd talked to him as if to an equal with all the respect that deserved. It had been a very long time since someone not in the know had done that. Though...perhaps she already knew, through the Storm Arcobaleno in her Family.

"If I may ask," she said, attention on Reborn, the foreign baby and not Tsuna, the teenage friend, "what are you tutoring Sawada-san in? I was under the impression that his grades were adequate for the time being."

Reborn didn't miss the sharp look Masami sent Tsuna — as if to say they had better be adequate or else — who shook his head frantically in denial. So, she had been the one to motivate his student before? And judging from the slight apprehension in Tsuna's body language, her ways had not been purely kind by civilian society's standards.

Reborn approved. Sorely.

He contemplated whether or not he should tell the truth — he was fairly certain she would believe him — but the girl was smart. She would figure it out eventually, and with his uncertain, clumsy student evidently both daunted by her and fond of her, it would be child's play to wiggle the truth out of Tsuna if she so wished. There was also Fon to consider...

"It's my job to train Tsuna to become the Vongola Decimo," Reborn declared. "The head of the largest, strongest mafia Family in Italy."

Tsuna choked and stared in dread at Masami, who merely blinked, eyes tightening minutely. "Reborn! You can't say things like that in broad daylight!" he yelled. "M-Masami-san — "

Masami turned to pin her gaze on Tsuna, no doubt, or condemnation on what was visible of her face but a certain exacting element to her gaze. "Are you saying he's lying to me, Sawada-san?"

Tsuna's jaw dropped to the ground, looking frantically from his tutor to his classmate and then back. It was a clear lose-lose situation for the boy. If he lied and said yes, Reborn would put him through hell, and Tsuna knew it. If he told the truth and said no...

That would just open a new can of worms. Which was exactly what Reborn had intended from the start. His dumb student needed to learn how to navigate these types of situations.

"Err...uhh...no...?" Tsuna managed weakly, grimacing. A mistake, Reborn thought at once, a Mafia Boss should never show weakness, but before Reborn could...ahem, correct his new charge, he was beaten to it.

The fan was snapped shut and introduced to the back of Tsuna's skull with a speed and precision that Reborn could appreciate. Tsuna went down with a screech that sounded more resigned than anything, hitting pavement with a thud.

"Please keep your head up and refrain from hesitation, Sawada-san," Masami demurred, walking past the quietly watching Reborn and the fallen Tsuna, hair ornaments swaying in the wind. "Also, Mafia Boss or not, at this rate, you will be late to class."

Hmm, so she'd accepted the truth, after all, and with an impressive lack of fanfare and fuss...and in doing so, accepted Tsuna himself. Reborn would have to keep a close eye on her. Such potential wasn't at all frequent, and Tsuna would need Guardians.

"Wait!" Tsuna called, scrambling to his feet, the speed with which he recovered informing the hitman that this was a common occurrence and that Masami hadn’t actually hit too hard. His face shone with mingled apprehension and hope. Hmm. "You mean you don't mind?"

"We have already discussed the issue of sheep mentality," Masami tossed back, "so I don't believe there is no reason to revisit it. The bell will ring in five minutes, and unlike me, I doubt Onii-san will take your tardiness kindly."

Tsuna squeaked and started sprinting. An older brother? This would bear investigating too, but all things considered, Reborn decided as he walked after his student at a much slower pace, the morning was getting off to a wonderful start.

Masami watched the "duel" between Mochida and Tsunayoshi from the back of the room, concealed by shadow and ignorance. As a prefect, she supposed she should break it up, but she'd much rather observe silently.

Displaying such negative behavior would have been bad for her reputation anyways.

To her slight gratification, her sort-of student didn't run from the match, most likely knowing that if he had, he would receive a beating from either Reborn or Masami, whoever got to him first. Pragmatic behavior was acceptable but taking the coward's way out was not. If he really cared for Kyoko even as a person, he shouldn't and wouldn't less this pass.

"Do you think he'll win?" The baby who had shown up two minutes ago spoke from his position on her shoulder, sounding more detached than worried.

"It's highly possible," Masami allowed. "If he keeps a cool head and doesn't panic, he should be fine." Although, that armor that those two students were lugging forward was...odd. Unbalanced.

"You've been training him, haven't you?"

"For the past three years. If he loses, would you mind giving him my regards?" In the most educational way possible. Mochida might be the Captain of the Kendo Club, but he was hardly, hardly a proper dance partner, especially with the level Tsunayoshi should be at by now.

"Of course." Reborn sounded more or less delighted to do so. "It's hardly proper behavior for a Mafia Boss to lose."

"...Mochida-san's cheating," Masami commented when Tsunayoshi almost collapsed to the ground after donning the armor.

"That armor is far too heavy for Dame-Tsuna, yes."

"Weight training later, perhaps?"

"I'll take care of it."

"The judge...is also a member of the kendo club."

"Favoritism then." Reborn shrugged, stroking the back of his chameleon. "This'll be a good test for him."

Tsunayoshi put up a decent show, Masami admitted, despite his handicaps. He was able to block Mochida's hits and even got a few blows in himself, not that it mattered since the judge refused to raise the flag for him.

"It's time," Reborn suddenly proclaimed, a gun appearing in his hands. "He needs to die."

He was losing, perhaps a minute away from being humiliated in front of the entire class — and even if he did, Masami would teach Mochida a lesson later about calling Kyoko a prize — but she tensed nonetheless.

No one, not even the World's Strongest Hitman, was allowed to kill one of her own.

The only reason she kept herself from interfering promptly via tessen was because she knew Tsunayoshi was also Vongola's new Heir. It wouldn't do for him to be murdered by his tutor. Still, she said, low and almost offhand, "Die?"

"It won't be permanent," Reborn chirped and shot Tsunayoshi in the head.

It happened fast. There was a spurt of blood, a thump as he fell to the floor and the room exploded into chaos...and then he was leaping to his feet, his clothes and armor disintegrating, and shouting at the top of his lungs about how he would defeat Mochida.

"...please explain," Masami requested as Tsunayoshi charged forward, forgoing grace for a headlong rush that resulted in Mochida's bokken breaking and a devastating head-butt. Which was...effective, if crude and clumsy.

"That was the Dying Will Bullet," Reborn said while Tsunayoshi ripped a handful of hair off of Mochida's head, the judge, of course, not giving him the point. "If someone regrets while they die, they are reborn in Dying Will Mode."

She connected the explanation to Kyoko's story easily, mentally face-palming at the thought that his last regret had been being unable to confess. Tsunayoshi was kicking Mochida in the chest at the moment. "And that is...?"

"Dying Will Mode switches off a person's safety limiters in exchange for them risking their life, granting them great strength, power, and invulnerability. For five minutes." According to the clock, three minutes and twenty seconds had already passed.

She eyed the stunning orange flame on Tsunayoshi's forehead, wondering if she would have to warn her brother that the school might burn down. "There are no consequences?" In all the stories, power necessitated a trade-off.

"Not for now," Reborn said as Mochida abruptly became bald and started bawling his eyes out. Maybe Tsunayoshi had been affected by her nonchalant ruthlessness after all? Or was it this "Dying Will Mode"? "Later, there will be."

"Lethal?"

"I won't let Dame-Tsuna die. It's my job to see him become a magnificent Mafia Boss and he can't become the Vongola Decimo if he's a corpse." A reasonable justification, one that she would accept for the time being.

"Thank you for the clarification." Masami rose to her feet, Reborn jumping off with ease. "Would you please inform Sawada-san he is to come over for tea on Saturday at two o'clock? I'm sure you already know where I live."

"Certainly. He'll be there."

"Goodbye, Reborn-san."

"Ciao ciao."

As she left through the side exits, Masami noticed a flash of green from the corner of her eyes.

Masami sat on a zabuton in front of the chabudai, sipping black tea. The familiar ritual was comforting as she thought about the recent developments.

Tsunayoshi had been hit with the Dying Will Bullet again, this time because he had been dragged into the Volleyball Tournament. He had grown much stronger than the weak boy in fifth grade but to jump that high was still out of his reach.

The Vongola Decimo...

Even though she had been aware of Sawada Iemitsu's true position and job, she'd never expected Tsunayoshi, civilian, pacifist, and fluffy, to become so directly involved with the Mafia, much less be the heir to the Vongola. It was…alarming.

Despite Tsunayoshi's vehement protests, Masami could see that Reborn had no intention of listening and would complete his mission through whatever means necessary. The baby hitman was a very good dancer, much better than they were at the moment. She had caught on to that fact almost immediately, one of the many reasons she had chosen not to interfere with whatever he was planning despite her own possessive nature. Yes, Masami had claimed Tsunayoshi as hers a long time ago, hers to train and protect and mold, but she could be a graceful loser.

There was no need to get in a dance she couldn't win and potentially drag her brother and Clan into the mess as well, especially since Reborn didn't actually mean Tsunayoshi any (permanent) harm. She knew what she had managed to coax the boy into in the span of three relatively peaceful years. She would see what this cursed baby could make the boy into with the help of unmitigated chaos and danger.

So Masami would step aside and watch and occasionally assist, all the while knowing Sawada Tsunayoshi would either die or eventually become Vongola Decimo. He might burn the syndicate to the ground in the end because his morals were just that unshakable, but the ascension would happen first.

And what would that mean for her? She was no fool; she knew that Reborn's interest had been piqued. In the whole of Namimori, she was probably the second best dancer, with her brother as the best.

A Mafia Boss needed subordinates. And Masami was Tsunayoshi's friend, if not mentor, confidant, and advocate. It wasn't hard to see where this was going.

Sadly for Reborn, Masami wasn't willing to entertain the idea of submitting to anyone, much less someone currently weaker than she was. Onii-san, Okaa-san, and Otou-san were one thing — and they hadn't really been asking for submission — but Tsunayoshi?

No.

He was one of the few beings she voluntarily interacted with on a daily basis, but her freedom, her freedom. Kyoya understood her, and Masami understood him; neither of them ever tried to chain down the other by words or actions no matter the circumstances.

Becoming part of the Vongola Family would tie her down, even more than Namimori kept her trapped. And she couldn't stand the thought of that, couldn't entertain the idea of staying in a gilded cage of rotten politics and broken promises.

Not to mention, Tsunayoshi was just too...soft for her. She appreciated his compassion, his kindness, but that wasn't what Masami needed in a leader.

Kyoya walked into the room on silent feet, though she sensed his presence immediately.

"Tea, Onii-san?"

"Hn." He relaxed onto a cushion opposite her. "You've offered an invitation?"

"Hai. Reborn-san should be here in an hour or so. Sawada-san as well." If nothing else, Reborn would drag her poor classmate over for the experience of dancing with a skilled partner. Masami was certain of it because she would have done the same.

Kyoya frowned. "The herbivore?" he identified with distaste. Tsunayoshi might have improved, but he was far from Kyoya's level.

"If you want to dance with the carnivore..." Masami trailed off and sipped at her tea serenely. It wasn't as if she would leave her brother and her charge alone together. That would be disastrous. And Tsunayoshi might end up in the hospital. 

For all of her "challenging" training methods, she did understand the concept of acceptable limits and boundaries. She had the feeling Reborn didn’t.

Kyoya twitched. "If he gets in my way, I'll bite him to death." With that winning promise, he got to his feet and stalked out of the room. "I'll be in the dojo."

Masami hummed in response and began to prepare some snacks for the approaching guests. Knowing Tsunayoshi, he would be freaking out and nearing fainting status by the time he got here.

She had been working on his confidence, but her brother tended to inspire fear in everyone he met.

Precisely one hour later, there was a hesitant knock on the door. Upon pulling it open, Masami was amused to find that her prediction was completely accurate.

Tsunayoshi stared at her with wide eyes, anxiety written all over his face. Having been persistent in her refusal to visit the Sawada household, Masami had never welcomed him into her home, with the exception of that time with the Yakuza, and most certainly not when Kyoya was around.

In comparison, the hitman that stood next to Tsunayoshi was wholly relaxed and greeted Masami with a mischievous smile and a "Ciaossu!" She was fairly certain that Reborn had, in fact, dragged her classmate over against his will but said nothing.

Instead, Masami smiled and bowed. "Greetings, Sawada-san, Reborn-san. Please, come in."

Tsunayoshi saw fit to gift her with a deer-in-headlights look. He didn't move a finger.

Inwardly sighing, she was about to remind him that it was impolite to simply stare when Reborn kicked sharply at his ankle, resulting in a cut-off shriek and rabbit-like hopping. "Be a gentleman and answer her, Dame-Tsuna," he ordered.

Tsunayoshi grumbled, to Masami's slight amusement, before looking back up at her with a sheepish smile and bowing appropriately. "Thanks for inviting us, Masami-san."

She nodded in acknowledgement and tilted her head to signal for them to follow her. "Shoes off please." Tatami mats weren't built for the heavy trend.

"Oh. Right."

After they obeyed, Masami turned and led them through the hallways of her home, taking no notice of the way Tsunayoshi looked around with curious eyes. He had been too rattled that one time before to pay attention to his surroundings, a failing he appeared eager to correct now.

Both Masami and Kyoya were traditionalists in the end. While Kyoya had his ideas on immaculate dress, acceptable rules, and correct conduct, Masami valued impeccable manners, appropriate respect, and classic rituals.

Between her, who couldn't stand cluster, and her brother, who hated excessive adornments, their home was on the conservative side. The walls were blank but for some kanji and old paintings. Other than the occasional potted plant and simple bouquets, there was a general lack of color. Nonetheless, there was the raw beauty of a traditional Japanese house: fusuma panels, shoji screens, and all.

"Your home is beautiful," he said quietly as they approached two solid wooden doors in the far left wing of the massive mansion, awe clear in his voice.

She smiled softly and pushed one of the doors open, holding it so that Tsunayoshi and Reborn could enter first. "Thank you, Sawada-san."

Tsunayoshi smiled back at her as he passed, warm and sincere, and for a moment, Masami felt mildly guilty. Silly boy. What had she said about being aware of danger?

Judging from the smirk on Reborn's face before a tilt of his fedora concealed it in shadow, he at least knew full well what was waiting for Tsunayoshi beyond the doors.

Masami slipped into the dojo and closed the door behind her, leaning on the cool wood and turning her attention to Tsunayoshi just in time to see him pale and sway in place when he caught sight of Kyoya.

Kyoya went through his final set of katas, ignoring the guests until he was finished. Unfurling himself, he smirked wickedly, utterly focused on Reborn while completely ignoring Tsunayoshi's presence. "Baby, I want to fight you."

"Maybe later," Reborn refuted even as he pushed Tsunayoshi forward against his will. "Tsuna will fight instead."

Oh? Masami raised an eyebrow thoughtfully. Tsunayoshi wasn't anywhere close to Kyoya's level, despite his improved combat ability, so unless that Dying Will Bullet was used...

But that was probably the point.

"Hiiiiieeee!" That tendency to screech like a banshee that neither Masami nor Reborn had been able to beat out of him yet would certainly not impress Kyoya.

As expected, Kyoya flicked a disdainful glance at Tsunayoshi and dismissed him of being worthy of attention. "That herbivore is hardly a good opponent. Baby, fight me."

"How about this? Tsuna will fight you for five minutes, and if he loses before that time, I'll fight you," Reborn proposed, ignoring Tsunayoshi's hissed protests. The way he was waving his arms, you would think he was trying to learn how to fly.

Kyoya considered it.

(The herbivore was just that — a herbivore — but the carnivore wasn't going to let any other arrangement suffice, and this was the herbivore his sister had been accompanying for the past few years.

So. Might as well see how successful Masami had been.)

"Fine. Prepare to be bitten to death, herbivore," he intoned, settling into a crouch and raising his weapons.

Tsunayoshi grimaced and cast a pleading look towards Masami, who merely smiled half-encouragingly and half-threateningly as Reborn walked back to stand next to her. There would be no help from her.

"Herbivore," Kyoya warned when the hesitation continued.

At last, with a groan and a sigh, Tsunayoshi squared his shoulders and stepped forward to slide into a combat position in the center of the room, resigned eyes fixed on Kyoya. This would be a curious dance indeed.

Kyoya didn't hesitate and lunged forward, aiming to strike his opponent down in a swift, brutal blow. But Tsunayoshi ducked under the tonfa, and even from where she was standing, Masami saw Kyoya's eyes widen. He hadn't expected that. At all.

"Wao," he purred. Then, Kyoya bared his teeth in a wild grin and began to fight in earnest.

It was a rather one-sided fight, all things considered. Kyoya went at Tsunayoshi without hesitation or reserve, and Tsunayoshi dodged, weaved, and eluded every last blow, not even bothering to try and get a hit in himself. Just as well, too, since even a single connected impact would result in painful defeat. Kyoya was attempting to get a handle on this new opponent's strength and potential, but he wasn't holding much back either.

"Sawada-san won't last long at this rate," Masami observed, momentarily bending down to offer Reborn her shoulder, an offer that was quickly accepted. "He's doing well, all things considered." Kyoya could be terrifying on the ballroom floor.

"No problem," Reborn chirped, raising the gun that had suddenly showed up in his hand. "I never expected Dame-Tsuna to go against Hibari Kyoya for much longer anyway." Two minutes had already passed in the blur of battle.

Tsunayoshi twisted around a downward strike and skipped backward, almost suffering a blow to the head. Ten seconds later, his footing faltered for but a moment —

"Fight with a Dying Will." Reborn fired without hesitation. Kyoya leaped back automatically at the sound of gunfire, his eyes darting between his sister and his opponent. Tsunayoshi jerked, the bullet entering his forehead, and fell back.

"...Is this it?" Kyoya scowled with a trace of disappointment, tonfa lowering slightly. Three minutes had passed. "Pathetic. Masami, what was that — "

"REBORN!" Tsunayoshi yelled, an orange flame appearing in the center of his forehead, and his clothes, barring his underwear, tearing to nothingness as he jumped to his feet. "I'LL DEFEAT HIBARI-SAN WITH MY DYING WILL!"

"Too loud," Kyoya and Masami said at the same time, in the same blank tone, though Kyoya followed the annoyed comment up by lunging at Tsunayoshi once more, scowl deepening. "Shut up."

Tsunayoshi let loose with a berserker sort of shout and drew back a fist. The smack of flesh against metal echoed audibly, and then they were moving again, this time with Tsunayoshi actually able to get in some offense in.

"It's still not enough," Masami said, frowning when a tonfa hit Tsunayoshi's side hard enough to bruise at the very least, while the returning fist was dodged effortlessly. "He's...reckless in this state." No plan, no tactics, no strategy.

"Hmm," Reborn agreed as he tracked Tsunayoshi, who was bashed in the jaw harshly and then kicked into a wall, his flame spluttering out. "But five minutes have already passed."

"Tch." Having heard the statement, Kyoya straightened up and glared at Reborn but didn't demand another fight. Rules were rules, after all. Instead, he put away his tonfa and turned to look at Masami, who obligingly stepped away from the door.

"You will continue to train the herbivore," Kyoya said over his shoulder as he headed off to the bathroom for a shower, "and he will come here every weekend for a spar." He left without bothering to wait for a response.

"Would that be alright with you, Reborn-san?" Masami asked lightly, gathering up a water bottle and a towel for Tsunayoshi, who was beginning to peel himself off the floor with a groan.

"Sure. It'll be good practice for Tsuna. He learns better through direct experience."

(While Masami had beaten the basics into Reborn's student, she hadn't truly pushed him for more than the ability to protect himself. But the Vongola Decimo needed more than to be able to protect himself. He needed to protect his Family, and that required strength, experience, and resolve. And that was best gained through unrelenting battle.)

She nodded and knelt next to Tsunayoshi, cataloging his injuries with a glance. Nothing too serious; Kyoya had gone — relatively — easy on him. "Drink."

"Ah...thanks, Masami-san," he said, smiling ruefully up at her. Swallowing several mouthfuls of water, Tsunayoshi dragged himself to his feet, shoulders slumping with exhaustion.

"You did well," Masami praised, knowing she had surprised him when his head snapped up and he gaped slightly. "You'll do better next time." There was nothing but absolute certainty in her voice, and he heard it.

Tsunayoshi ducked his head, but she saw a smile stretch across his face, shy and proud. "...yeah. Thanks, Masami-san."

"Don't think that means you can slack off, Dame-Tsuna," Reborn warned, whacking his student on the head none too gently, based on the startled yelp.

"Reborn!"

"So," Masami started off after Tsunayoshi left to take a shower. "The Vongola Decimo." She poured the boiled water into the teapot and started on the coffee, movements efficient and practiced.

"The Tenth Head of the Vongola Family," Reborn confirmed, taking a seat on one of the zabuton set out in the sitting room. "One of the most powerful mafia syndicates in the world."

"Am I to take this for the reason there was a transfer request for a Gokudera Hayato from Italy?" she questioned airily, grinding the coffee beans up without missing a beat. Learning how to make coffee had been one of Okaa-san's requirements, although Masami rarely needed to do so at home.

"Probably," he said. "Where did you hear that from?"

"The Disciplinary Committee can be influential in Namimori Middle School. I'm the... secretary." Not exactly but close enough.

"That so? I would approve that request if I were you." Calm, easy, not a hint of threat.

She wasn't fooled. "Onii-san already has." Kyoya couldn't care less whether or not a student might be Mafia.

"Good." She could hear the smug smile in Reborn's voice. "Gokudera will be a good test for Tsuna."

"Will you continue to test Sawada-san until you deem him ready to be a Mafia Boss?" That sounded rather...dubious. But she supposed he genuinely had nothing else to do.

"But of course." Reborn nodded in thanks when she pushed the cup of coffee to his side.

Masami sat in seiza with careless grace, pouring a cup of tea for herself. "Why?"

"It's my mission."

"From who?" The Vongola, definitely, but who of the Vongola.

A sharp look from the deadly predator that faced her. "It's not important right now."

Very well. She supposed she couldn't win every fight. "How's the coffee?"

Reborn took a sip and hummed. "Too mild. Do better next time."

"As you wish," she demurred sweetly.

He peered closely at her, pitch black eyes uncomfortably knowing. It seemed to be a trend among the Arcobaleno, especially since their age and experience contrasted so sharply with their appearance. "What do you want to ask me, Masami?"

"What might your plans be," Masami said slowly, meeting those eyes squarely, because, even here, even now, it was beneath her to show unease, "regarding Onii-san and I?" This...indulgence was suspicious, superfluous. He wanted something from them.

Masami didn't like it.

Reborn smirked. "You two would be good additions to Tsuna's Family."

She paused and took a sip of tea, refraining from continuing the conversation until she was sure her face and body revealed nothing. "I don't believe Onii-san would agree." She didn't agree.

"Persuading him would be up to Tsuna," he concurred with a shrug. "And in your case as well."

Masami didn't quite have the chance to reply before Tsunayoshi stumbled in, but that was fine. She didn't know what her reply would have been anyway.

"Ow..." Tsuna whimpered, collapsing on a zabuton after showering. The dark blue yukata that he wore was just a tad too big, but it was better than his original, sweat-soaked clothes, so he couldn't complain.

But, Kami-sama, Hibari hit hard. Blue and purple bruises were already blooming all over his skin. Tsuna knew the drill after training with Masami, even though his classmate had never, ever pushed him this far; he was going to wake up sore and aching for the next few days.

"Finally back, Dame-Tsuna?" Reborn was sitting next to him, drinking a cup of coffee with a sophistication that looked really out of place on an infant. "It's bad form to keep someone waiting for so long."

"Hey! I'm the guest here!" Obligatory protest completed, Tsuna promptly turned to Masami, who sat on the other side of the table with a teacup, and bowed. "I'm sorry for taking so long, Masami-san!" He was well-trained after all.

While Reborn's eye twitched irritably, Masami smiled in approval. Tsuna resisted the urge to light up like a lantern. "Don't worry about it, Sawada-san. I understand that Reborn-san is to take my place as your tutor?"

"Err...yeah." Tsuna winced, feeling guilty even though it wasn't exactly his fault. "I'm sorry, I know this is sudden, and I really appreciate everything that you've done for me, but my mom just sprung this on me and I didn't have a cl — "

"Please stop rambling," Masami said at the same time that Reborn punched him in the side and barked, "Dame-Tsuna, babbling is unseemly."

They went still and stared at one another while Tsuna's blood ran cold. Oh... Oh no...they couldn't do this to him...one Spartan tutor was scary, but —

"Well, you seem like a good influence on Dame-Tsuna, so feel free to stick around," Reborn said with a (falsely) innocent grin. "You could even give me a hand now and then."

"I would be honored," Masami answered with an angelic smile — ' DANGER! DANGER!'  Tsuna's senses shrieked — "Perhaps you'd like to know the extent of my efforts before more progress can be made?"

"Go right on ahead."

"Nooooooooo!" Tsuna broke down, clutching wildly at his head and banging his fist on the ground. "Two Spartan tutors?! I'm not going to make it! I didn't know it was possible, but Reborn's worse than Masami-san and — "

A cuff to the head sent him slamming down into the floor with his signature, "Hiiiieeee!"

"That...noise needs to go." He heard Masami remark through the roar of blood in his ears.

"Once he goes through my training, it absolutely will," Reborn guaranteed with an evil cackle.

Poor Tsuna could only curl up into a ball and cry silently for his doomed future.

"So that's your herbivore?" Kyoya sounded a tad disgruntled that night over dinner, frowning at Masami.

She raised an eyebrow, unruffled. "I doubt Sawada-san would appreciate being called 'mine.'"

A fluid shrug. "It's the truth." As far as they saw it anyway.

Masami sighed. "I take it you are satisfied with the time I have 'wasted'?"

"He's not a carnivore." Which, from Kyoya, would count as a "maybe." A far better judgment than what was passed on ninety-nine percent of the town, surely.

"Not yet, but he'll get there eventually." With Reborn training him — she was not ignorant of Tsunayoshi's plight, having seen that sadistic look — the boy would either become a carnivore or die.

It was just that simple.

The next morning, bright and early, Masami paid a visit to Gokudera Hayato.

O

Chapter Text

Tarantella: a rapid whirling Italian dance in 6/8 time, usually mimicking either courtship or a sword fight.

As it turned out, Gokudera Hayato lived in the middle-class part of town, the apartment he had recently rented out suspiciously close to the Sawada Residence.

Honestly, it was as if that boy was becoming a magnet for trouble. Or rather, being made into a magnet for trouble by Reborn.

Strolling casually up the road to the apartment at the brink of dawn, Masami knocked on Room 37's door and waited. Two minutes later, the door was yanked open ferociously and familiar emerald green eyes glared out at her. So he was the one who had been watching Tsunayoshi fight Mochida. "What!?"

'Rude,' was her first true impression. 'Foreign delinquent,' was the second. Neither was much of a good one.

Gokudera Hayato was a teenager with shoulder-length silver hair and a dark scowl, pale skin and sharp features. He wore several gaudy necklaces, bracelets, and belts, all of which were quite unneeded, in her humble opinion.

He was also very obviously not wearing the school uniform.

Of course. What else had she been expecting?

Inwardly, she reminded herself of his test scores, of his so-called genius, of the very interesting phone call she'd had with a family contact. Appearances were deceiving, Masami herself being a prime example.

On the surface, Masami kept her composure and bowed shallowly. "Greetings. I am Hibari Masami, the Secretary of the Disciplinary Committee of Namimori Middle School. I'm here to brief you on your situation as a transfer student."

Normally, this would be Kyoya's job, but, well, that wasn't a good idea. For both parties.

"Tch, I don't need briefing," Hayato snarled, not unlike a feral cat. "Why don't you just go back to wherever the hell you came from?"

"That would be fine, but I'm afraid you would then be asked to return to wherever you came from," she replied without missing a beat, snapping her fan open to air herself. "Which will it be, Gokudera-san?"

If it was at all possible, Hayato's scowl deepened further, but he pushed off the doorway with a glare and spun on his heel to stalk inside. Masami took the concession for what it was and followed him serenely, closing the door behind her. Instantly, the nauseating scent of smoke assaulted her senses. A quick glance around found the source: a small tray on the black table held three cigarette butts, all clearly used and not long ago, to boot.

Ah, lovely. Smoking was prohibited by school regulations. Kyoya would be furious the second he heard. At least he hadn't shown any inclination to vandalism yet. Although, with what he was known for in the Underworld...

Masami reigned in a sigh and turned her attention to the apartment.

The walls were a pale cream, the rug beneath feet a deep black. The majority of the furniture was dark in color as well, a small TV placed on a black table against the wall. It was a very clean, very simple design that was also rather conspicuously lacking any signs of being lived in.

Was he not planning on staying in Namimori long? Or did he simply not see this place as home? Neither boded well, and Masami took care to keep her face blank and her body language neutral.

For all of his unpleasantness, Gokudera Hayato moved with the air of someone who knew combat. 'Smokin' Bomb' was certainly a pointed epithet. The faint outlines beneath his clothes hinted that he wasn't exactly helpless at the moment either.

Just as she settled down on a couch, a flicker of black and white caught her eye. A large object was placed just around the corner. She wouldn't be able to see it unless she physically got up and walked over, but the shadow looked like —

"Alright, spit it out," Hayato grumbled, flinging an arm over the adjacent couch back and cutting into her thoughts. "I have better things to do than this."

Masami didn't react to the disrespect beyond a slow blink. However, she did take a slight vindictive pleasure in his flinch at the loud bang the encyclopedic-sized rulebook she retrieved made when it collided with the heavy oak table in-between them.

"What the hell is that?" he yelped, eyeing the book with a mildly disturbed look.

She smiled agreeably. "'That' would be the rules and regulations regarding Namimori Middle School and the Namimori Town in general. Please look over them all — you are liable to get hurt otherwise."

While Hayato gaped, Masami went on smoothly, "Unfortunately, cigarettes are banned in Namimori Middle, so I'll have to ask you to refrain from smoking in school. It is expected that each and every student attending will be wearing the school uniform unless the Disciplinary Committee has specifically noted otherwise. Please take note that anyone disrupting the peace will be punished."

She paused and observed his incredulous expression with some measure of well-hidden satisfaction. "Do you have any questions for me?"

He spluttered in outrage. "H-Hold it, who do you think you — "

"Excellent. If that is all, I will be taking my leave." Masami rose to her feet. "It was a pleasure to meet you, Gokudera-san. I dearly hope that there will be no cause to do so again in the future."

And she politely let herself out.

Masami lounged on the engawa and thought absently that she might need to thank Reborn later. All these years and she had barely exchanged five words with her father while he was out taking care of business, and now, here they were.

Albeit, Satoshi didn't sound very happy at the moment. "You're childhood friends with the future Vongola Decimo."

Masami didn't hesitate to pitch her voice guileless and innocent. "Otou-san, I wasn't aware Sawada-san was connected with the Vongola in any way when we first met," she said. "When I found out, I'm afraid it was much too late for anything to change."

She didn't mention that she'd honestly had no intentions of letting things change. Oh, Masami could have cut her ties then and there, could have rejected Tsunayoshi so harshly and coldly that he would have backed off himself, but she hadn't.

Masami hadn't wanted to, out of some strange, twisted sense of responsibility perhaps. There was no point in starting something without following through, and the only one at the time who might have been able to change her mind had been Kyoya.

Kyoya, who might or might not have entertained that thought once or twice himself. He had definitely disapproved of the herbivore, and even now, after Tsunayoshi had finally won a measure of grudging respect from the Skylark, Kyoya remained dismissive of the boy.

But that was alright. Her brother was willing to wait, willing to guide Tsunayoshi through the more complicated dances with violent reminders and nudges, and with Reborn also at the helm, Tsunayoshi would be shaping up in no time.

More importantly, while Kyoya might have considered forcibly separating Masami from Tsunayoshi, he had never actually done anything. That was the general rule of thumb that had kept the two siblings from snarling at each other for all of these years.

So, in the end, even with the introduction of the Vongola in the mix, neither of them had done anything to change the status quo, although Masami had increased her vigilance.

Otou-san's voice came out stern. Disappointed. "You should have told me."

Masami squashed the flicker of guilt down, unnerved by her own unease. It was rare nowadays. "There was no need. Sawada-san's father may be the head of CEDEF, but Sawada-san himself was an ordinary citizen with no knowledge of the Mafia."

A quiet scoff. "Do you think that matters? Sawada Iemitsu, the Young Lion of Vongola would not be lenient regarding his family's safety. If he believed you or your brother posed a threat to his son, do you truly believe you would survive the death he would bring down?"

She opened her mouth to argue and then shut it, mind whirling as she considered all the pieces she had in her grasp. The Hibari Clan was a powerful family. Kyoya and Masami were, as far as she knew, the babies of said Clan though they were powerful in their own right, and if even Satoshi was wary of this Vongola —

Well.

Rika had always warned her about being overconfident. Her mind inadvertently pulled up images of assassins sneaking into Namimori under the cover of night, and oh, she despised the thought that she might have endangered those who were hers because of an arrogant miscalculation.

"...my apologies, Otou-san," Masami said. It stung at her pride to admit a mistake, but self-denial wasn't a good road to walk down. Better to deal with this issue now, akin to ripping off a band-aid, than to let it simmer and grow into a tumor.

Satoshi sighed. "Rika taught you secrecy, Masami. But don't forget that some secrets are too dangerous for you to hold onto."

"I understand." Briefly, she wondered if she should inform Tsunayoshi of the true nature of his father's work. Reborn didn't seem willing to. "What can you tell me about the Vongola?"

"The first thing you need to know is that they didn't start out as Mafia."

"No?"

"The man who founded the Vongola Family, Vongola Primo, was said to have begun the organization as a vigilante group. No one truly knows what happened, but it's said that his Mist Guardian eventually revolted and ran him out of Italy. The Vongola started to become what it is today under Vongola Secundo's reign.

"Mist Guardian?" The term as a whole didn't make much sense to her.

"Guardians are Flame Active individuals Harmonized with a Sky." There was a pause. "You didn't understand a word I just said, did you?"

"I'm sorry, but no." Although, now Masami had a semblance of an idea of what Reborn wanted from them.

Satoshi sighed again, and slowly, painstakingly, began to explain Dying Will Flames.

Masami had hoped that Hayato would keep out of trouble. Somehow. Some way.

Alas, it was not to be. Perhaps it was fate. Or perhaps it was a certain Sun Arcobaleno.

"I take it this is your doing?" she asked the baby sitting on the window sill. The new transfer student wasn't wearing the school uniform or eating lunch peacefully in some isolated corner like he should be. Instead, he was smoking half a dozen cigarettes and flinging dynamite around, yelling threats at Tsunayoshi.

Years of training were the only reason Masami was able to simply lean against the door and watch. She wasn't sure which part of this entire scenario was the most repugnant. Her fingers flexed.

"That's right," Reborn replied, not at all concerned about the student currently frantically dodging dynamite sticks. "I told Gokudera that if he can kill Tsuna, he can become the Vongola Decimo."

She was silent for long heartbeats, calmly tracking Tsunayoshi's movements as he ran this way and that, shouting at Hayato to stop before someone got hurt. "I'd like to believe that I'm smarter than that, Reborn-san," she murmured.

If that was truly the case, after all, then there would be hordes of eager Mafioso pouring into Namimori.

"Heh. I suppose you are," he confirmed nonchalantly. "There's no need to worry, Masami. He's just here to keep Tsuna on his toes."

"And this...test is to gain Sawada-san a new subordinate?" He wasn't actually doing a half-bad job of avoiding the dynamite, but he needed to counterattack soon. That boy had always been rather stubborn about peace and whatnot. Masami hadn't bothered to try and change that aspect of his because —

She knew the value of kindness, of hope and warmth. She knew that sometimes, violence would only make things worse, would only exacerbate a situation. She knew that honey caught more flies than vinegar.

Satoshi and Rika had been clear on this, in their own distinct ways. Rika had taught sweet manners and sly smiles even while she directed Masami through kata after kata. Satoshi had talked about herbivores and carnivores but expanded more on politics and diplomacy.

The Hibari Clan believed most staunchly in power, but that didn't mean they were blind to all else. Masami was fairly certain that even if she had tried, Tsunayoshi's soft heart was so much an irrefutable part of him that nothing would have changed anyway.

She could respect that, even if she didn't need it.

(How would that soft heart survive the Mafia?)

"Of course," he chirped with a mischievous smirk. "A Mafia Boss needs trustworthy subordinates." She had no doubt that was at least partially directed towards her.

Masami ignored it. "Dead end," she commented as Tsunayoshi accidentally boxed himself in. "What now, Reborn-san?"

Reborn just smirked wider and raised his gun. "Fight with a Dying Will," he ordered and shot.

"No matter how many times I see it..." she muttered to herself, shaking her head slightly as Tsunayoshi fell back and then burst out of his clothes, roaring loudly about putting out the fuses with his 'Dying Will'. Couldn't he be a little quieter about it at least?

"You'll get used to it," he reassured her, almost casually. "You'll probably join the Family, too, after all."

Masami didn't deign to respond to that. Tsunayoshi or not, guarding someone for the rest of her life didn't sound all that pleasant to her. Besides, her attention was more preoccupied with the fact that Hayato was handling far too many dynamite sticks at once — the foolish, foolish boy — and predictably, he dropped one, right near his feet.

That idiot was going to kill himself. And he had the nerve to try and do it before she could get her hands on him, too.

The weight of her fan on her hand was comforting. She hoped rather spitefully that she would break a few bones.

"Wait," Reborn commanded.

Masami hesitated reluctantly.

Tsuna was still getting used to the idea that Gokudera was now apparently his subordinate — because he'd somehow won their fight and not because he'd saved his classmate's life; how in the world did that work!? — when a shiver went down his spine and he went pale.

Oh. Oh no.

Tsuna spun around and was met with an avenging angel.

Masami loomed over the frozen boy, the polite smile on her lips more terrible than his greatest nightmares and eyes so very, very calm. Her closed tessen tapped lightly on the palm of her hand in a gentle rhythm. All in all, she would have looked completely normal if not for the dense aura of icy murder and rage that folded around her like a thick cloak.

Tsuna squeaked and fell back. He fought the urge to cry. It would only make things worse if he fell back on his dameness. Not that he would know, because hieeeeeeee, when was the last time Masami was angry —

Nope. No, nu-uh, Tsuna was pretty sure, very sure, absolutely, positively, completely sure that he'd never, ever, ever seen Masami looking anything more than a tad annoyed, much less angry, and never ever utterly furious. Yeah, there had been that time with the Yakuza, but that had been different!

She was almost, practically, sorta angry at him this time!

"Sawada-san," she said, oh-so-quietly, "I'm afraid public indecency is against the school rules. If you simply must destroy your clothes at odd times of the day, then please start bringing along extra sets of school uniforms in your book bag."

Tsuna could only nod frantically, voice having deserted him, and pray that —

"Oi, don't you dare talk to Juudaime with such disrespect!"

Nope. Kami-sama wouldn't answer his prayers. He was doomed.

Or rather, Gokudera was doomed. Tsuna was probably, most likely, certainly doomed by association.

The fan left Masami's hand with a deft flick of her wrist and slammed straight into Gokudera's solar plexus before anyone could blink. Tsuna almost wanted to clap in admiration at the incredible precision and power in the effortless attack.

Almost. Instead, Tsuna winced sympathetically. He knew how much that hurt.

Gokudera bent over on impact with a choked-off gasp, all the air in his lungs successfully forced out and his unlit dynamite sticks falling to the ground. He was thrown back by the force behind the steel fan and fell back onto the ground, dazed.

"And you, Gokudera-san." Masami turned gracefully on Gokudera, to Tsuna's tremendous relief and slight guilt. He didn't think his new...err, subordinate/classmate/maybe-friend realized the trouble he was getting into by interfering with a Hibari Masami on the warpath.

Still, what Gokudera had done was really, really dangerous, and Masami was well within her rights to reprimand him for it, both as an almost victim — hahaha, not really, that was (not) funny — and a prefect.

She was much better at making lessons stick than him anyways. Exhibit A: Tsuna. Exhibit B: Umm...everyone else in their school.

Masami smiled, soft and sweet and sharp, and stalked forward. "Assuming we disregard that I have already informed you that smoking is forbidden, the school uniform is mandatory, and the peace of Namimori is to be kept, there is still that little matter of your usage of dynamite on school grounds."

Gokudera, it seemed, had long-buried survival instincts after all. He scrambled to his feet and backed away from her, eyes wide. "What the hell do you think you're d — " he started indignantly, but she cut him off in an uncharacteristic display of rudeness.

"If you were unaware previously, then I'd like to inform you right now that, in the event of a chemical reaction with the science materials located not five meters behind you, your dynamite could have killed not only everyone here, but the many innocent students residing in the school as well." She tilted her head, voice mild and pleasant.

Tsuna's eyes went wide with dismay while Gokudera flinched slightly, lips pressing tightly together. The bomber couldn't seem to be able to find a counter to that and glanced away, face pinched and shoulders tense.

"And please consider, what if," Masami continued, steady and relentless, "what if Sawada-san had been just one second slower? Half a second even. I assure you, a corpse has never been of any use to a leader, any leader, let alone a Mafia Boss."

She fell silent ominously. The world held its breath. A chilly wind swept past them, causing the half-dressed Tsuna to tremble. Reborn watched the proceedings behind the shadow of his fedora, making no move to interfere.

Picking up her fan and spreading it with a crackle, Masami hid the bottom half of her face behind the silk and steel, pinning Gokudera to his position with her unforgiving eyes alone. "I understand this may be a traumatic experience, but do you have anything you'd like to say, Gokudera-san?"

Gokudera flushed slightly and crossed his arms, looking at the ground with a heavily furrowed brow. He mumbled something under his breath, looking embarrassed and resentful and a tad bemused, like he had never been scolded for not taking care of himself and others before.

One slender eyebrow arched; a kind, merciless smile. "I'm sorry, but I couldn't quite hear that. Would you please repeat it for me?"

"Jeez, I said it won't fucking happen again, alright!?" Gokudera finally spat out, glaring hell-bent at Masami. "You happy now!? Fuck off, you self-righteous witch! You're not even in the Mafia! What the hell do you know about how we do things!?"

Oh. Oh. Tsuna wanted to be back in his bed, preferably under his blankets and with his face buried in his pillow.

Thankfully, however, Masami seemed to be satisfied with that. In an instant, the refined rage and cutting edge to her demeanor fell away, leaving behind the aloof, dignified prefect Tsuna normally knew. He breathed a silent sigh of relief.

"Perhaps, but the fact remains that I am responsible for the safety of the students here." Masami turned away from Gokudera. "The bell will ring in a minute, and I expect to see the two of you in detention after school for the next three days. Sawada-san, the spar Onii-san requested?"

"I know, I know. Saturday, right?" Tsuna scrambled to his feet and made sure to stand straight, suspecting he would get punished otherwise. Detention was already bad enough, even if he had expected it.

"We'll be waiting." With that sinister prediction, Masami left the rooftop, closing the door gently behind her and leaving Tsuna, Reborn, and Gokudera lingering on the rooftop, an almost awkward silence falling between them.

Tsuna wondered what sort of drama show his life was now. It looked like it was leaning a little towards the action side with a touch of horror.

Gokudera was quiet for another heartbeat, brooding, almost sulking, before growling, "What a stone-cold bitch! Who does she think she is, acting like she's all that!? Don't worry, Juudaime, I'll blow her up next time so she can't bother us — "

"Gokudera-kun." Tsuna snapped himself out of his thoughts with a shake of his head. This was more important. Smiling as warmly as he could, he knelt beside the bomber. "It's alright. Masami-san's a good friend of mine. She can be scary when she's angry, but she doesn't mean any harm. But you know… maybe she's a little right."

Poor Gokudera looked flabbergasted. "J-Juudaime!?"

"You should have more care for your life," Tsuna scolded, calling on what little assertiveness Masami had managed to beat into him. "She's right. If I was a few seconds too late — " He winced, unable to bear thinking about it. Tsuna rubbed at his bare arms, unreasonably cold despite the wind having let up.

"Nothing bad would have happened," Reborn stated, stepping forward for the first time since shooting Tsuna in the head.

"Eeeh?" Tsuna furrowed his brows in confusion. "What are you talking about, Reborn? Gokudera-kun would have gotten blown up! That's very, very bad!" Though, for some reason, Gokudera was looking rather starry-eyed at the moment.

"Masami was all ready to intercept with that fan of hers before I stopped her," Reborn told them. "Dame-Tsuna, why haven't you persuaded such a useful person to join your Family yet?"

"I'm not going to be a Mafia Boss, Reborn!" Tsuna reiterated, exasperated. "And Masami-san isn't just a 'useful person'! I'm not going to make her join if she doesn't want to!"

Reborn's response was to jump into the air and kick Tsuna in the head.

"Hiieeeek! Reborn, what was that for!?"

"Dunno, I felt like it."

Masami glided into the Reception Room and took a seat on the sofa. She leaned back and closed her eyes, inhaling and exhaling slowly and deliberately, as her mother had taught her ever so long ago. She wanted to leave, wanted to just forget all of her responsibilities and run.

But she couldn't, of course, not with the piles of work on her desk, not with the herbivores who stumbled along the school hallways, not with hitmen and mafia haunting her hometown. It was nearly enough to make her resent the world, just a bit.

Masami ran calculations through her mind, the process starting to become as easy as breathing, though not as easy as dancing, and decided that she had enough time to simply laze around for a while. It was becoming a bit of a commodity.

There was a sigh. "Tetsuya," Kyoya called in-between clean, precise servings of his bento.

The door creaked open, the muted steps of the second-in-command of the prefects on the carpet. Masami felt his concerned gaze on her for a moment, before it turned to Onii-san. "Yes, Kyo-san?"

"Get Masami hot chocolate."

"Hai."

And that, right there, was why she put up with their nonsense. Not that Kyoya would understand why she was so upset even if Masami told him about the whole situation right now. They had such different views on the world.

It was why Masami had bothered with Tsunayoshi while Kyoya would have bitten him to death without remorse.

Kyoya was nearly always firmly in the present. He saw what was and based his actions off of that. Herbivores were herbivores; carnivores were carnivores. He didn't care for things like what-ifs. The closest he'd ever come was giving Tsunayoshi time to 'grow his fangs' before going all-out and determining the proper hierarchy of things.

Masami wanted what could be. There were an infinite amount of possibilities inherent in the universe, and she cherished that. It wasn't so much that she wanted to explore it all, only that she enjoyed the knowledge that she could, could roam the globe to her heart's content, could make of herself whatever she wanted.

It was for that reason she hadn't dismissed Sawada Tsunayoshi outright. It was for that reason Masami didn't precisely approve of murder. And it was for that reason she was so very angry with Gokudera Hayato at the moment.

Didn't he know what he had almost thrown away? It was infuriating, especially for someone of his rumored intellect.

"The herbivore?" Kyoya questioned idly, and Masami pressed her lips together.

"Taken care of." If one could take care of suicidal herbivores. Still, better not to tell Kyoya about the dynamite issue. That was just asking for Gokudera Hayato to get sent to the hospital.

"And the omnivore?" His new nickname for Tsunayoshi.

"A guest on Saturday."

He grunted. "Good."

There was a peaceful pause while Kyoya ate and Masami half-heartedly dozed.

Then, "Masa-san, I have your hot chocolate."

She resisted the urge to groan and sat up. "Thank you, Kusakabe-san." Taking the cup from him, Masami covered a yawn and heard the bell ring. Sighing to herself, she rose to her feet and left for class. Thankfully, she had no afternoon classes with Tsunayoshi and Hayato.

Not so enjoyable was the pile of work waiting for her after school.

"Masami, I'm leaving," Kyoya spared the time to inform her, lingering by her doorway after his patrols.

"All right." She didn't look up from the paper advocating for a field trip for the tree-hugging club. Which was fine, really, if they weren't planning on going to a football arena. "Dance well, Onii-san."

He grunted, and then the silence in the office was official.

Masami tapped her feet on the carpet and rejected the proposition.

It was a lie. Her peace was a lie.

"Y-You! What are you doing here?!" Two days later, Hayato pointed a belligerent finger at Masami, who was unwrapping her lunch, blissfully unaffected by the aggression spilling off him in waves. "Get away from Juudaime!"

"Gokudera-kun! Please stop!" Tsunayoshi panicked, glancing back and forth between his two friends. "Masami-san normally sits with me during lunch when she isn't busy with the Disciplinary Committee!" Which was becoming less and less often.

Masami broke apart her chopsticks and nodded to a Reborn who had suddenly jumped down from a nearby tree in a well-manufactured leafy costume. "Greetings, Reborn-san. Gokudera-san, must I remind you that smoking is prohibited?"

Hayato's eye twitched even as he scoffed and removed the lit cigarette to stomp it out underneath his shoe. "What the hell is it to you!? Don't think you can come in all cool as ice and shit and tell me what to do! I'll blow you up!"

"Gokudera-kun!" Poor Tsunayoshi, having to leash the bomb-happy hitman. Masami didn't envy him at all. "No, no, don't get out the dynamite! Hieek, Masami-san — !"

Her gunsen left her hand with a neat flick, meeting the target's chest squarely and sending him skidding back with a pained grunt. Hayato was silent for two more seconds, most likely out of shock and the need to regain his breath, before promptly exploding into an incensed rant.

As he didn't have dynamite out this time, she did nothing but gesture for Tsunayoshi to hand her back her fan. Positive and negative reinforcement. She was pretty sure she had seen a lesson on that in one of Onii-san's nature television shows.

Masami happily ignored the fact that those shows were in dealing with unruly pets. Perhaps she would invest some time in researching psychology later. She certainly hadn't forgiven or forgotten what had happened three days ago, and she had honestly had no reason to investigate an unhealthy disregard for life before.

If nothing else, Tsunayoshi didn't have that problem. In fact, he was quite aware of his own mortality, to the point where he ran away from chihuahuas. "Gokudera-san, dynamite is forbidden on school grounds. Sawada-san, stuttering and begging is unbecoming. Please cease and desist."

Off to the side, Reborn drank his coffee and smirked.

Hayato didn't know what to think of Hibari Masami.

His first impression of her was that she was some ordinary civilian, if with freakishly perceptive eyes and a cool smile, so damn polite that it had annoyed the fuck out of him. Not to mention the completely absurd book of school rules she'd left on his table.

After skimming through it, he had promptly torn it apart and recycled it all, but the reminder had still been irritating.

Who did she think she was, ordering Smokin' Bomb Hayato around!?

(He decided not to consider the fact that she didn't actually know who he really was.)

His second impression of her was that she was most certainly not an ordinary civilian but was actually scary as fuck. The scolding she'd rained down on him had been infinitely worse than any of his father's. With no warning whatsoever, the cool, calm girl had turned into a vengeful witch with a tongue of frost and eyes of diamond.

He was halfway certain that she was a UMA in disguise as a middle school student. Either that or an assassin.

Probably an assassin, now that he thought about it.

(She was the first one to ever become upset because Hayato had endangered his own life. Which. What. Why.)

His third impression of her was that she was seemingly his new, incredible, amazing, wonderful boss' friend, which he really couldn't understand but tried to anyway. At least, he reasoned to himself, such a frightening person was on the Tenth's side. And wasn't it fantastic that his boss could sway people like that!?

Hayato had seriously lucked out, becoming the subordinate of his Juudaime.

And he promised himself he would be the best right-hand possible for the Vongola Decimo, no matter what.

(For the one and only person who had accepted, truly accepted, bastard, worthless Hayato without even blinking.)

But —

"You're going to that witch's house!?" Hayato screeched, going pale. This was dreadful! Who knew what she would do to his precious Juudaime!? Not that he didn't trust the World's Greatest Hitman's judgment but still!

Masami reminded him too much of a professional hitman for him to trust the safety of his Boss to her.

Juudaime laughed and scratched the back of his head. "Uhh...yeah. I have to go spar with Hibari-san, Masami-san's older brother, or else they'll both get mad and that'd be, err, pretty bad."

Hayato frowned severely. It was wrong for his Boss to be frightened of anyone or anything. "What? Are they threatening you, Juudaime!? Do you want me to blow them up for you!?" No one would hurt Juudaime under his watch!

He chose to ignore his previous lack of success in injuring Hibari Masami in any way.

"No, no, no, it's not like that, Gokudera-kun!" Juudaime shook his head, waving his arms in an X shape in front of him. "It's just training, it's good for me. Besides, Masami-san won't let anything too bad happen."

Hayato would never know where Juudaime got that confidence from. In his humble opinion, that witch was nothing but trouble. Although, he admitted grudgingly, she had kept Juudaime safe before Hayato had come along, so maybe she wasn't that bad.

Still pretty damn bad though.

"If you're so concerned, Gokudera, then just come with us," Reborn recommended, having watched the argument go back and forth calmly. He was also abruptly in a kendo uniform, swinging a tiny bokken around. "Like Dame-Tsuna had the sense to say, it'll be good training!"

"Reborn!" Juudaime yelled, going a horrifying shade of white. "That's a terrible idea! Masami-san and Hibari-san will kill him and then they'll kill me!"

"Don't worry, Juudaime! I'll protect you!" Hayato declared, meaning the words with all of his heart.

Strangely enough, Juudaime didn't look very reassured.

"If you don't hurry up, Dame-Tsuna..." Reborn held up an enormous pocket watch to show his student. "...you'll be late."

"Hiiiiiieeeeee!"

...and that was how they all ended up on the doorstep of an archaic Japanese mansion that could easily pass for a Mafia Base. Hayato had his doubts.

Juudaime, fidgeting and uncomfortable, stepped up and knocked lightly on the door. Hayato shifted his weight from his left foot to his right and resisted the urge to light up a cigarette. Going by past experience, that...probably wouldn't turn out well.

And he definitely didn't want to cause any sort of trouble for Juudaime!

The door slid open precisely two and a half seconds later.

And Hayato's jaw dropped.

Okay, he had worked out one Hibari Masami. She was Juudaime's oldest friend. She was the sister of Juudaime's sparring partner. She was a terrifying witch when angry and somehow capable of acting like an angel from above when otherwise. She was a prim and proper prefect.

This...creature in front of him didn't fit into any of those categories.

Masami was dressed in an ombre kimono, a pretty purple that gradually faded into brilliant crimson. Pure white kanzashi flowers pinned her dark hair up and hung next to her face as she looked them over.

She looked sophisticated and traditional, cultured and refined. She looked noble and dignified and harmless, a lady of old. She looked far more mature than a fourteen-year-old. She looked like some ancient geisha-in-training. She looked —

Completely blank for just a moment upon seeing Hayato. It didn't last but it made him scowl nevertheless, mood instantly souring.

"Greetings, Sawada-san, Reborn-san, Gokudera-san." Masami gave her usual neutral smile, sweeping a bow that was even more ornate than normal because of her kimono.

"Good afternoon, Masami-san!" Juudaime, ever the nice and cordial boss, smiled warmly and bowed back, eyes darting nervously between Hayato and Masami.

Hayato inwardly seethed as Reborn chirped a "Ciaossu, Masami." There was no reason Juudaime should ever bow to anyone but days of eating lunch with them both had informed him that this was a common occurrence. At least Masami had the decency to return the gesture.

"Going to let us in, maiko witch?" Hayato barked when those damn witch eyes settled on him, demanding despite no words being spoken. "Don't you dare leave Juudaime standing out here in the sun!" He might get sunburned, and that would be an absolute disaster!

At that, he got a raised eyebrow that said quite clearly she found the new nickname questionable and his lack of manners impolite but would indulge him anyway. Turning, Masami began making her way inside. "Welcome. For safety reasons, please refrain from displaying shoes, dynamite, and cigarettes in my home."

It was painfully obvious of whom the last two referred to. And what sort of fucking 'safety reasons' were there in the first place!? If she didn't want him here, then she should just say so outright, not that he would be leaving without his boss, approval or not.

Hayato gritted his teeth but subsided when Juudaime sent him a pleading look. Slipping his shoes off with a bit more force than absolutely necessary, he stomped after her, scowling. "Who's this brother of yours anyways!?"

"You'll see," she replied serenely, gliding through the hallways with ridiculous grace. "I would advise you not to anger him, Gokudera-san."

"Oi, what the hell does that mean!?" All-too-familiar reminders to 'stay out of the way, Hayato' and 'just...go to your room' drifted through his mind. "You think I can't take him!?" He wasn't weak, damn it! Weak people were useless, and Hayato couldn't — wouldn't be useless.

"No, Gokudera-kun, please don't!" Juudaime cut in, looking disturbingly concerned as he increased the length of his strides to sidle in-between them. "Hibari-san can be really, really scary, so, please don't."

Hayato couldn't decide whether he should be happy Juudaime was obviously worried about him or hurt that Juudaime didn't think he could take this 'Hibari-san.' He needed to be the perfect Right-Hand Man, after all, and that meant he needed to be able to take on anyone and everyone. "Juudaime — "

Masami turned around at long last in front of double doors, kanzashi flowers swaying. "You could not defeat Sawada-san," she said flatly though not unkindly. "Sawada-san can not defeat Onii-san. I'm sure you can determine the results."

Hayato blinked, knocked off-balance for a moment. "Juudaime can't defeat this guy?" Reading the mildly rueful confirmation on Juudaime's face, he tilted his head curiously and thought about this new development.

It only took seconds for things to click, and he slammed his fist into his palm. "Ah! Of course Juudaime is so smart and devoted that he's training with a strong opponent he can't defeat so he'll improve! I should have seen it earlier!"

For some reason, Juudaime looked a little pained. "Errr...Gokudera-kun, that's not it exactly..."

"Onii-san's waiting," Masami said and pushed the doors open.

Masami was not looking forward to introducing Gokudera Hayato to Hibari Kyoya.

For one, solo was great, double was suspicious, and triple was a crowd.

Actually, in Kyoya's world, two was a crowd, too, but at least they were a mildly carnivorous crowd.

Hayato might be a hitman, might even be dangerous with those dynamite of his, but he was far from Kyoya's level. For that matter, he wasn't even up to Masami's speed of dance. Not yet, at the very least, though, like Tsunayoshi, he did have the potential.

That was a bad line of thought for such a pleasant morning. She pushed it away.

For two, Hayato was hostile and foolish enough to directly challenge Kyoya.

Masami was much more tolerant than her brother, and what she put up with in the name of peace, Kyoya would certainly not. Blatant disrespect to Hibari Kyoya would not be acceptable, much less in his own Territory. Hayato would be bitten to death without mercy, creating a whole new set of problems.

For three, said boy was Tsunayoshi's "subordinate."

Should it come to a fight, Tsunayoshi would feel obligated to intervene out of his usual idiotic sense of duty and compassion, which would get him hurt. It would turn into a bloodbath in Masami's home, and that was simply unacceptable.

And then there was Reborn, who would most likely just exacerbate the situation.

No, Masami was not at all happy to play the mediator in these circumstances. Not that she let her irritation show, but it coiled deeply in her chest nevertheless, buried beneath a layer of ice and just waiting to lash out.

"Masami." Kyoya frowned at Hayato, who was already bristling. "What is the meaning of this?"

Supressing the urge to sigh, Masami leaned against the wall and spread open her fan, shielding her face. "Onii-san, this is Gokudera Hayato, Sawada-san's subordinate. Gokudera-san, this is Hibari Kyoya, the President of the Disciplinary Committee."

The two sized each other up for a heartbeat before Kyoya scoffed and turned away. "Why is he here?" he demanded.

"I believe it was to guard Sawada-san," Masami answered as Hayato's eyebrow twitched.

From you, from us went unsaid.

"Herbivores are not welcome in my home," Kyoya said, tonfa appearing in hand. "Get lost."

Hayato gritted his teeth, dynamite sticks also showing up out of nowhere. "What was that, you bastard!?"

"You heard me. Leave or I'll bite you to death." Kyoya's grin could only be called bloodthirsty.

"Hiieeee!" Tsunayoshi flailed. "Gokudera-kun and Hibari-san are going to fight?!"

"If you don't want them to, then stop them, Dame-Tsuna," Reborn said, completely unruffled.

"What are you talking about, Reborn!? I can't do that!"

For her part, Masami was clinging onto her patience as her brother and her classmate prepared to dance. She rather liked her home, thank you very much, and wasn't at all interested in watching it get destroyed. Ryohei's constant visits were bad enough.

But she had a hold on her emotions. Rika would have been disappointed otherwise.

Until Hayato, a flush high on his cheeks and mouth set stubbornly, whipped out a cigarette and lit it. Predictably, Kyoya's reaction was to narrow his eyes and ready his pair of tonfa for a biting.

There was going to be dynamite blowing up in her home, a lingering scent of smoke that would take weeks to air out, and her student was regressing into herbivorousness, if that was a word.

And even worse, a certain someone was being reckless again. You would have thought he would learn from his mistakes, but no, apparently not.

Masami set her shoulders and glided forward, holding onto her self-composure in a bloodless grip. Tsunayoshi scrambled out of her way with a squeak while Reborn simply stepped to the left and watched her curiously.

She ignored them both.

Instead, Masami stopped right in front of the two to-be-fighters and tapped her foot on the ground with what remained of her patience. Alerted by the frigid murderous intent in which she had clothed herself, Kyoya and Hayato turned to eye her cautiously, still in combat positions.

"Masami — " Kyoya chided just as Hayato snarled, "Witch — "

She snapped her fan closed with a sharp snap and directed it at the two. "Not in the house... please," Masami warned, poised smile never faltering.

Both of them clearly wanted to argue.

Both of them sensibly did not.

Masami's smile widened a fraction, deceptively angelic and innocent. "Thank you. Now, Sawada-san, please enjoy your dance with Onii-san, while I serve Gokudera-san and Reborn-san tea and coffee."

No one tried to protest.

Two hours later, she watched a limping Tsunayoshi walk home with Reborn scolding him for being so pathetic and Hayato fussing like a mother-hen. Kyoya was off napping in the garden again, and the house was still standing, which was naturally the most important part.

All things considered, Masami mused with a satisfied smile, the visit hadn't gone as bad as she'd thought it would. She had spent the majority of the two hours arguing physics with Hayato, with Reborn occasionally chiming in with the mathematical aspect of things. Which had clued her in on how intelligent the Sun Arcobaleno was. And also — again — how stupid the Smokin' Bomb was, because he was just as smart as she had suspected and knowing that he had been going to kill himself through a case of butterfingers was...frustrating. To say the least.

He could be a revolutionary scientist. He could be a spectacular engineer. He could be so much and yet.

Masami took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

As Hana would say, such a monke —

"All right. What have the monkeys been doing now?" Hana asked, arching an eyebrow. Her arms were crossed over her chest, her stare disapproving as they wandered down the road to the new shopping center Kyoko had insisted they look at.

Masami blinked, perplexed. "Nothing, Kurokawa-san. As far as I am aware."

Hana snorted, tossing back her long hair. "Don't give me that. You look exhausted."

Masami examined her reflection discreetly in a nearby window. There didn't seem to be anything too amiss, although she supposed she should redo her hair when they arrived at their destination since her kanzashi was crooked and several dark strands hung loose. And maybe her uniform was slightly rumpled from dealing with more of Hayato's shenanigans a few hours ago — at least he'd keep it to an open, abandoned area this time — but it wasn't anything for Hana to openly comment on. "How so?"

"Well," Hana revised, "you look more exhausted than I've ever seen you."

"You do look a little tired, Masa-chan," Kyoko piped up, peering at the other girl with wide, concerned eyes. "You have dark circles under your eyes. Are you okay?"

Dark circles? She had been a bit caught up recently with all of her classwork, homework, paperwork, and sorting out the pandemonium exploding over town, but she hadn't been aware her sleep patterns had suffered so badly. If it was visible however...

"I'm fine," Masami assured. "I've simply been preoccupied with completing Gokudera-san's transfer papers. I'll be done this weekend."

Kyoko smiled, bright as the sun. "That's good! Hey, after we look at the clothing section, do you guys want to check out the makeup aisle? I hear they have a really good selection."

Masami watched Hana press her lips together and spoke up before her classmate could shoot the idea down, "I wouldn't mind."

Kyoko beamed and Hana sighed, and if in the end, Masami bought concealer and foundation for a darker reason than cute boys, then they never needed to know.

Hayato was proficient in Italian, Japanese, English, and French, in that order. Hence, after he had scoped out Juudaime's home, the area around Juudaime's home, the nearby yakuza gangs — they were all pretty small and weak — and the filthier spots in town, he headed straight for the library.

There was no such thing as a language barrier in the pursuit of knowledge!

Of course, Hayato made sure to wait until Juudaime was safely at home and Reborn was there watching over his Boss. There was absolutely no way he would have left his Boss in danger of any kind. That wasn't Right-Hand Man material.

For such a small town, Namimori's Public Library wasn't half-bad. Sure, their Italian books were kept solely to the children's section, and they had a truly deplorable science fiction collection, but their nonfiction area was great. Hayato browsed the shelves for hours, ignoring the startled glances he got from other patrons.

It was like belts and necklaces were illegal in a library or something. Whatever. He was used to being judged.

Carefully balancing a stack of perilously stacked together books, Hayato glared at a guy until he went away and stole his chair and table. He ignored the crash that resulted when he slammed his books down and the stack finally toppled, and the glances that prompted.

Dropping into the chair with a sigh, Hayato ran his hands through his hair and tied it up into a ponytail. Slipping on his glasses, he grabbed the first book (Learning Italian for Dummies) and cracked it open.

Then, he read. And read and read while the sunshine steadily lessened, only to be replaced by artificial light, and the dull murmur of voices around him quieted. It was easy to become absorbed in information, in the theories and concepts that he understood so easily.

Hayato wasn't sure what tipped him off at first.

There wasn't much noise at all, so maybe it was the rustle of a skirt or the soft, too-close sounds of breathing. It could have been just his instincts or a glimmer of black in the corner of his eye.

He didn't know, but he did jolt from his trance long enough to look up after an indeterminable amount of time had passed. It didn't feel like a threat but you never knew until you were dead.

Hibari Masami lounged casually in the chair on the other side of the table, cheek braced against her knuckles. An open book rested on the table in front of her, and, to his annoyance, the deep purple glasses she wore only accentuated her gray eyes.

They also made her look slightly more harmless than normal, but he ignored that for the sake of his sanity.

Hayato choked on his own spit when the situation finally registered in his befuddled mind. He pushed off frantically from the table with his feet and ended up sliding his chair three meters away with a shrill sound like nails on chalkboard. Then, he overbalanced and fell back, landing on the thankfully carpeted floor in a frankly uncomfortable position.

There was a beat of very awkward silence.

"...greetings to you, too, Gokudera-san," Masami said mildly. She probably nodded politely as well, or some other shit like that, but he couldn't exactly see her from this angle.

He groaned. "What the hell are you doing here, maiko witch?"

"This is a public library," she reminded him.

Hayato sneered as he got to his feet but didn't yell. He respected library etiquette, even though the witch really did deserve getting yelled at. "Couldn't you have found a different table?" he grumbled. "I'm busy!"

"Busy reading," she commented. "As was I."

Before you decided to freak out.

He scowled, rearranging himself back into his previous position, albeit with a good two arms-length more between him and his apparent deskmate. "Just shut up. I can't concentrate with — what the fuck are you reading?"

Masami glanced down "Well," she drawled, "it appears to be a book on anger management, but I could be mistaken."

Hayato stared blankly at her. "Why the hell do you need a book on anger management?" he demanded. Even when she had been pissed at him, she had been totally in control of herself and her actions. And, well, Juudaime and Reborn really didn't need this either.

She only raised an eyebrow at him.

He was a certified genius. It only took Hayato a few more seconds to get it. "Oh, right, you have to deal with that homicidal brother of yours." The one who had hurt his Juudaime and the one who Hayato definitely hadn't forgiven. That one.

At that, Masami smiled wryly. "Something like that."

"MAAASSSAAMMIII-SAAAAANNN!"

"I'm sorry for disturbing you, but I think someone's calling for you, Masa-san." Tetsuya said to the girl in question.

Masami sighed and rubbed at her temples. "I would never have heard," she replied. With the addition of Reborn in Tsunayoshi's life, he only seemed to be landing in more predicaments than usual. Cleaning up their messes was becoming more work than it was worth.

Rising from the sofa — where she had been in the process of taking a long overdue nap — she walked to the door and opened it just in time for Tsunayoshi to fall through and sprawl on the carpet. "Greetings, Sawada-san," she said with a bland smile. "What brings you here? Lunch began ten minutes ago."

Tetsuya very kindly closed the door behind him as he left.

"Masami-san!" Tsunayoshi gasped, scrambling to his feet. His eyes were wide and frantic, and his hands were already tugging at his hair. This was clearly off to a wonderful start. "I'm going to get expelled!"

She blinked. "Expelled." That was new.

"Yes, Nezu-sensei said we're going to get expelled if we don't dig up the time capsule in the playground, but there's no way we can do that, and ahhh, I'm never going to see Kyoko-chan again, what am I going to do — "

Whack!

"Hieeee!" Tsunayoshi hit the ground head-first and laid there for a second, hands covering the lump developing on his head. "Masami-san...! What was that for!?"

"You were rambling," she said, taking a seat on the sofa once more. "I didn't understand a word that came out of your mouth."

He grimaced but pulled himself up again and took a deep breath, visibly trying to settle himself. "Okay." Another slow inhale and exhale. "Okay."

Masami waited patiently, and eventually, Tsunayoshi pulled himself together enough to painstakingly explain what had happened. She listened without a word, and when he was done, kept quiet for another minute, thinking.

She had been in Nezu-sensei's class before, she recalled. Technically, she still was, but this was one of the few occasions in which she had taken advantage of her new status as a prefect. The Principal just wasn't courageous enough to demand anything from Kyoya's people.

Simply put, during that first week of school, Dohachiro Nezu had left a rather unattractive impression on Masami with his constant insults and boasting, and she'd never felt the need to return to that science class for anything other than important tests and projects, preferring to study from her textbook instead.

Considering she had received a full grade on her last exam, it seemed to be working just fine.

"You said the time capsule was in the playground?" Masami said at last, tapping her fan against her thigh absently.

"Y-Yeah." Tsunayoshi groaned.

"And am I right in assuming you would rather not be expelled?"

"Of course!" He was starting to look uneasy now, eyes darting towards the door. Smart boy. 

But not smart enough.

Masami smiled and glided to the door. She opened it and watched as Hayato fell through the doorway and sprawled on the carpet with a startled yelp in a mirror of Tsunayoshi's entrance. Halfway through the downward motion, Reborn jumped off of his head and landed seamlessly on Masami's shoulder.

"Greetings, Gokudera-san, Reborn-san," she said while Tsunayoshi stuttered incoherently.

"Ciaossu, Masami," Reborn chirped. There was an abrupt thunking sound, and they both turned to see Hayato prostate himself in front of Tsunayoshi, forehead pressed against the floor with absurd force.

"I'm very sorry, Juudaime!" he shouted, apology in every line of his body. "Things turned out like this without me even knowing you didn't want to be expelled that badly!"

Masami wondered who exactly wanted to be expelled.

"Since things are like this, let's dig up the time capsule together, at any cost! I have a good idea in mind, just leave it to me! We don't need her help!" Hayato went on, shooting a nasty glare at Masami, who remained unconcerned. "Come on, let's go!"

"Please wait a moment," Masami requested, because there were only so many ways you could recover a time capsule buried underneath a playground. "Precisely how are you planning to accomplish your goal?"

Hayato leaped to his feet, scowling for all he was worth. "That's none of your business, maiko witch! Just stay out of this!"

"G-Gokudera-kun!" Tsunayoshi protested, and Hayato's shoulders fell. Masami couldn't help but sigh when Hayato proceeded to produce a handful of dynamite sticks.

"No."

"But — "

"Absolutely not." Masami glanced at the clock. "Onii-san will be back in ten minutes. Would you really like to explain to him why you wrecked the playground?"

Tsunayoshi's face acquired a nice tinge of green.

"I thought so. Would anyone like some tea?"

Kyoya strolled into his sister's office without knocking and twitched.

As expected, Masami was drinking tea, although, unlike usual, she wasn't working on paperwork.

As was completely unexpected and very irritating, she wasn't alone, and it wasn't even prefects surrounding her.

The baby — unnatural, predator, carnivore — sat on a small cushion beside Masami in a full-on tea serving outfit, tiny hands cupped around the steaming cup. Next to him was the bomb herbivore, his sister's newest project apparently, and completing the circle was the omnivore.

A small part of his mind appreciated the unprecedented variety in the room: three carnivores, one omnivore, and one herbivore. The rest of his mind disdained the crowding taking place in his territory.

Kyoya had opened the door into abject silence, so it didn't take long for every eye to turn to him, some more frightened than others. "Masami," he started because this was definitely her fault, "explain."

Masami smiled at him, innocent as could be. He had learned to be wary of that look before she was three. "Sawada-san and Gokudera-san would like to report a breach of the school rules."

The omnivore's responding squeak was somewhat mouse-like in nature. The herbivore glowered pathetically.

Kyoya crossed his arms and leaned against the doorway. "What is it?"

"A teacher," she murmured, eyes heavy-lidded, "appears to be abusing his authority. Dohachiro Nezu plans to expel Sawada-san and Gokudera-san for misconduct of the violent kind."

He snorted. "And what do you want me to do about it?" While Kyoya might appreciate his spars with the omnivore on occasion, those two were her projects, not his.

The herbivore bristled, but the omnivore reined him in easily with a quiet, panicked word. Hmph. Sheep, the both of them.

Masami fanned herself with the weapon he had gotten her for her birthday. "Excuse us from school for today, please. We're going to go on a tour."

"To where?"

"Nezu-sensei's residence, of course."

The omnivore spit out his tea.

"You're cleaning that up," Kyoya said.

"Masami-san!" Tsuna hissed, fighting the urge to cry as he jogged alongside his insane classmate(s). "Breaking and entering is against the school rules! Breaking and entering is against the law!"

"We have Onii-san's permission," Masami pointed out reasonably.

Or not so reasonably. "That doesn't change a thing! It's still illegal!"

"Don't worry about it, Juudaime!" Gokudera beamed at him and then abruptly whirled on Masami with a scowl. "Oi, maiko witch, don't you dare mess this up for Juudaime! I won't let you get us expelled or whatever you're thinking!"

"I assure you, Gokudera-san, if I wanted to get you expelled, you would be expelled," Masami retorted blandly and turned left, bringing them before a dingy condo. "This is where Nezu-sensei lives."

"We don't have a key, so we aren't going to be able to get in. We should just go back to school and talk to the Principal," Tsuna said, breathing a sigh of relief.

Which rapidly turned into a high-pitched whine of despair when Masami and Gokudera exchanged a look, and Gokudera silently, sheepishly retrieved a key from his pocket.

"Where did you get that!?" Tsuna shrieked.

"It was on his desk when we visited his classroom," Masami said.

Tsuna whimpered. "That's why we went back?" But then — "Why did we have to go to the convenience store then? And buy all of this - this stuff?" He peered dubiously inside the plastic bag he had been forced to carry.

Gloves, baby wipes, hair nets, odorless odor eliminator!? None of it made sense! And Masami had had to remind Gokudera to buy a trash bag for some reason, too.

"He's never going to catch us, Juudaime! I took classes on this." Hayato grinned, inserting the key and twisting. There was a click that froze Tsuna's next wail of pain.

"Here we are." A push and the door opened.

Tsuna stared. "Masami-san?"

"Yes?"

"Have you done this before?" He was feeling a little faint.

Masami's smile wasn't at all reassuring. "Why ever would you think that, Sawada-san?" She reached down and began to remove her boots.

Tsuna's jaw dropped to the floor. "E-Eeeehh?"

Masami didn't seem to hear him. Gokudera turned to Tsuna with a serious look on his face. "Juudaime," he started, and oh no, he knew this wasn't going to end well, "I know I'm not worthy of such an honor, but would you please hand me the trash bag?"

...wait, what? Tsuna shook his head and mustered up, "What?" It wasn't any more coherent than what he'd had in his head.

Masami sighed. "Please give him the trash bag, Sawada-san." Her tone was gentle, but Tsuna still jumped a little and fumbled around until he retrieved the black plastic bag and pressed it into Gokudera's hand.

Said friend was glaring death daggers at Masami even as he moved to shake the bag out and take off his own shoes. "Oi, don't fucking threaten Juudaime, damn it!"

"Not now, please, Gokudera-san," Masami said, looking like she had no idea that Gokudera was clearly ready to whip out his dynamite. "Sawada-san, shoes off, if you would."

"Uhh...ermm...why?" Tsuna asked, hopping on one foot to try and obey. Gokudera helpfully threw his shoes into the trash bag — what? Why? — and moved closer so Tsuna could use him as a brace.

Masami blinked at him. "Footprints."

Tsuna was really, really tempted to walk over and bang his head against the wall. Maybe if he was lucky, he would knock himself out.

"Don't even think about it, Dame-Tsuna," Reborn warned, leaping off the roof and engaging in a flashy sequence of acrobatics before touching down on the ground in a perfect three-point landing. He was wearing a black ninja suit, complete with Leon-colored headgear.

His evil tutor looked up with his customary smirk. "A Mafia Boss always supports his subordinates in whatever they do. Even if it's illegal. Especially if it's illegal."

While Tsuna was preoccupied with bemoaning his life, Masami plucked his shoes out of his hands and threw them into the trash bag. Gokudera tied up the bag with quick, deft movements, and hurled it through the air so it ended up plopped down in front of the driveway.

"Here, Juudaime!" Gokudera handed a speechless Tsuna gloves and launched another pair at Masami with unnecessary force. She caught it with ease, and they both tugged their gloves on before turning to stare expectantly at Tsuna.

"Stop being such a space cadet," Reborn scolded, kicking Tsuna in the stomach. "You're holding everyone up."

"Ooph! Alright, alright!" Gasping, Tsuna bent over and hurriedly put on the gloves. They were surprisingly comfortable. Gokudera hovered over him, hands held out like he wanted to help but didn't know how.

"The wipes, please?"

"I - I, why — " Despite his protests, Tsuna groped around inside the paper bag until he found the baby wipes and gave the container to Masami.

"Fingerprints." She pulled out a sheet and proceeded to clean the 'contaminated' doorknob.

"Don't forget the key," Gokudera grunted.

"Hai. Sawada-san, hairnets."

Tsuna mutely handed them over. Masami seemed to anticipate his question anyway. "Hair has DNA, you know."

Tsuna slid down to his knees, gripped at his hairnet, and tried not to hyperventilate. Reborn gave him thirty seconds to wallow in misery before he barked, "Dame-Tsuna, get yourself together."

Tsuna stood up. And got himself together. Glancing around, he was startled to find that his friends had already gone in before him. It took Tsuna another fifteen seconds to realize how suspicious he must look to the neighbors and rush inside, leaving Reborn to shut the door.

Masami and Gokudera hadn't gone far. They were standing in the hallway, already talking — arguing — strategy.

"The bastard probably has the files on his computer!" Gokudera argued, spraying around odor eliminator like it was going out of style. "We should check his office!"

"If he does have any ambiguous papers," Masami said, "then he would hide them somewhere close. In his bedroom, for example."

Tsuna's eyes were stinging. "We're going into Nezu-sensei's bedroom!?"

"See!? Juudaime agrees with me! We should go through his office!" Gokudera said triumphantly, sending Tsuna an adoring look.

Tsuna fought down a sob. "We're going through Nezu-sensei's office!?"

"Why don't you just do both?" Reborn suggested. "Gokudera can investigate his office, and Masami can investigate his bedroom. Tsuna will overlook the entire inspection."

Tsuna swayed from side to side as his vision blurred. "Why is this my life?" he moaned.

As it turned out, they were both right. Hayato easily hacked into Nezu's computer and found both real and forged school transcripts. Meanwhile, Masami discovered copies of the actual papers in a box under his bed, along with several books and photo albums of highly questionable material.

Really, the former was condemning enough. The latter was too much. She had only been trying to avoid the paperwork when she'd suggested this errant tour. Even Masami hadn't expected this.

"Oh," Tsunayoshi said when he saw the papers. Then, he saw the books and photo albums. "Oh no."

Hayato took one look at the contents of the box Masami held and erupted in a long stream of strange words that made no sense to either of them. She had the sneaky feeling he was cursing Nezu-sensei out in Italian.

Masami tilted her head and listened, imprinting into memory several of the phrases he was spitting out. With the way her life was veering, it sounded like a good precaution, even though she rarely cursed in Japanese, much less in Italian. Now that she thought about it...perhaps she should start learning Italian? It seemed likely that she would be traveling to Italy sometime soon.

That shouldn't make her happy. It did. She chose not to think about the reason.

"M-Masami-san?" Tsunayoshi stared, wide-eyed, at her. "Are you alright?"

She wasn't even in the mood to reprimand his slight lapse in speech. That should say something about her current mental state. Instead, Masami smiled, sweet and nice, just like Rika had taught her. "I'm fine, Sawada-san. Please don't worry."

Amusingly enough, Tsunayoshi plastered a blatantly disbelieving look on his face.

But it was the truth. This wasn't the all-consuming, arctic rage that had taken her over during that incident with the Yakuza. This wasn't even the cutting, acidic, indignant fury that had colored her words back with the dynamite incident. This was quieter. Purring, venomous, smug satisfaction. She was going to destroy that man, tear apart his reputation and ruin the rest of his life for good, and whoops, either she was picking up more of Rika's tendencies than expected or there was something very wrong with her equilibrium.

How unfortunate.

"You have what you wanted," Reborn commented, staring up at her with a knowing look. "What will you do now?"

"What do you mean, Reborn-san?" Tsunayoshi's brow furrowed, his innocence yet untainted. "We're going to give this to the Principal...right?"

Masami traded a look with Hayato, for once the two of them on the exact same wavelength. "No," she said. "No, we're not."

The crash of the cardboard box on Kyoya's desk was loud, shattering the silence. Not even flinching, Kyoya looked up and narrowed his eyes dangerously. Who dared to interrupt his peace?

Of course it was his little sister. What had she gotten into now?

"Greetings, Onii-san," Masami said, sweeping an elaborate bow. The herbivore and omnivore stood behind her, lingering in the doorway like easily startled deer. "We've brought you some gifts."

Kyoya frowned. He knew his sister tended to hide behind the intricate manners and exquisite decorum their mother had trained into her when she was upset. Rather than peer inside the box, he leaned back and looked at Masami.

It was...subtle.

Most people would never notice, not with that serene smile and ladylike posture. But Kyoya was Masami's brother, knew her better than any other living creature in this world, and he saw the deadly edge of anger in her eyes.

Worse than he had thought then. It was beyond rare for Masami to lose her temper, even with the added stress of the baby's recent antics.

Kyoya straightened up and considered the box.

The next day, Dohachiro Nezu woke up groaning in a hospital bed. Beside him were the papers that spelled his formal dismissal from Namimori Middle. There was also a notice that there would be a note put on his police record.

And, naturally, two days after that, Yamamoto Takeshi stood at the edge of the rooftop with his arm in a sling and the wind tugging at his hair, the ground so very far away.

Chapter Text

Kenshibu: a Japanese interpretive dance performed to traditional music with fans.

Masami was convinced that Reborn had succeeded in turning Tsunayoshi into a magnet attracting all of the suicidal herbivores to him. Otherwise, why else would she be snapping orders into her phone while keeping a wary eye on Yamamoto Takeshi, the idiot playing with death on the school rooftop, on a bright, sunny morning.

Although she had shared at least one class with the baseball star for the past four or so years, Masami wasn't well acquainted with Takeshi. She was aware that he was popular, friendly, talented, and the male equivalent of Kyoko's social status in the school, but other than that, she'd paid little attention to him.

There was no reason to, not until he'd apparently decided that breaking an arm and losing his valued sport for less than three months was a valid cause for suicide.

She should have, she thought. She should have noticed his smiles growing duller, his eyes sharpening ever more, his mask slipping away. Because, now with Tsunayoshi attempting to pull Takeshi away from the edge, Masami could look back and see the signs staring her in the face but it was much too late.

Honestly, of all the days for Hayato to be off restocking his bombs. Why, oh why, did her classmates insist on throwing their lives away? It boggled the mind. It was irritating.

(Past the aggravation and concern, some part of Masami could, perhaps, sympathize just a bit. For Takeshi, being deprived of baseball was akin to Masami being trapped in a cage or Kyoya laying his weapons to rest for good. Unspeakable, unbearable, unendurable. But suicide still wasn't something she could approve of. It was so wasteful.)

"The preparations are completed, correct?" A death in Namimori Middle was repugnant.

Thankfully, her brother agreed, if disdainfully. "Correct. The herbivore isn't retreating?"

"Sawada-san's working on it." If nothing else, Tsunayoshi could be incredibly charismatic when the situation called for it and was well able to talk fools from falling over that final edge.

An amused snort. "The omnivore has become a herbivore therapist?"

She smiled vaguely, eyes still glued to the spectacle of Takeshi and Tsunayoshi shouting at each other. "Something like that."

And then the fence broke.

Masami almost crushed her phone by accident, even though she knew full well no one was going to die today.

Takeshi hadn't meant to. Sure, he had been all ready to die for the sake of baseball, for losing the core of who he was, for failing at the one thing he was meant to succeed at, but he hadn't meant for things to end up like this.

Because, Tsuna, Dame-Tsuna, had come around and thrown all of that out the window, and Takeshi had no idea how that had happened. He had never paid much attention to Sawada before, at first because he was just that no-good boy hiding in the corner, no different from anyone else, and then suddenly he was off-limits because Hibari Masami.

Yeah, that was interesting on some level, because while Takeshi was one of the few people in the entire school to have the privilege of saying that he had little to no experiences with the Hibari Siblings, anyone with eyes, ears, and half a brain in their skull knew of The Hibari Kyoya's younger sister, the so-called angelic Masami. Personally, he'd always had his doubts about whether anyone could be such a messiah of grace and purity but had let it go because it wasn't any of his business.

He just kept to his baseball, after all, and it wasn't like she was insanely infamous like her older brother. Just...lots of rumors and conjectures. Which was fine, but after Hibari and Sawada had become friends, the other boy had turned into even more of a recluse. Before, there had been bullying and teasing, but later, there had just been a sort of determination to pretend he didn't exist, and then Takeshi had been distracted by baseball.

He had always been distracted by baseball, up until recently, when he couldn't be anymore.

Sawada had been becoming fascinating these past few weeks though. First, there was that cool fight with Mochida, and then there was that thing at the Volleyball Tournament, and more recently, there was that odd, sort of idol-like friendship between Sawada and Gokudera.

Sadly, he was still somewhat bad at sports, so Takeshi hadn't hesitated to invite Sawada over to his team when everyone else dithered. Apparently, Hibari had been accepted into the Disciplinary Committee and was even more terrifying than before because now she could tattle directly to her brother.

After that, asking Sawada for advice had come easily. He had blinked up at him with those wide, brown eyes, and said, clearly hesitant, "Well, err, I normally just do my best and hope things will work out, you know? Plus, Masami-san, and, umm, Gokudera-kun, are always around when I need help, so..."

Takeshi had nodded and smiled — just like always, just like normal — and then he had gone and broken his arm.

Standing at the edge of the rooftop hadn't been so hard, not nearly as terrible as the abandonment of everything he'd been since his mom's death. The guys who had come to watch (like he was an animal at the zoo, like this was only another game, and maybe it was) had been white noise, all until Sawada — no, Tsuna had burst in again, bright and warm like flame.

And he had been so obviously petrified, but Tsuna had reached out and tried, tried to help, saying things like he had always respected Takeshi, and his life wasn't worth this, and please, please don't jump because Takeshi was Takeshi, and no one could replace him —

Takeshi had been reaching back, because even he couldn't deny the sincerity in Tsuna's voice, and his hand had latched onto Tsuna's, and the fence had broken.

All of this swept through Takeshi's mind in a split second as gravity took hold, and he tipped off of the rooftop, unwittingly dragging Tsuna along with him. He was falling, they were falling, and Takeshi hadn't meant to do this at all. He didn't want to die now, and even if he'd had before, he'd never wanted to take Tsuna with him.

"I'm so sor — " he tried to say, meeting his savior and his victim's terrified gaze with his own, as heartfelt and as steady as he could make it, but then there was a sudden snap and something soft and unyielding caught him along the back.

They bounced once, twice, and abruptly, they weren't falling anymore.

Takeshi furrowed his brow, confused and disorientated and somewhat in pain, but Tsuna was already gasping and rolling away, blinking at the...mesh beneath his hands? Takeshi wasn't an expert or anything, but he was pretty sure Namimori Middle hadn't invested in a volleyball net this big before.

A glance up above showed that the roof, while distant, wasn't as far away as it should be, and a glance below showed that the ground was still quite a ways below them.

They were dangling in midair, held up solely by a lattice set up on the third floor of the school building.

"Sawada!"

"Hiee? Kusakabe-san!?" Tsuna called out, head snapping left, where a prefect stood by the window, holding onto one of the ropes to the net. The ropes to the right were tied to nearby trees, while the remaining ropes had been distributed to other prefects along the third floor classrooms with the correctly positioned windows.

"You're uninjured?" Kusakabe asked.

"Ah...y-yeah." Tsuna cast a quick, searching look at Takeshi. "Yamamoto's okay, too."

Takeshi watched their classmates on the roof peer down at them carefully. He considered things from their point of view, realized that everything probably looked like a giant spider web from above, and found himself laughing. "Whew! That was a close one!" he said, smiling because this was something he knew how to do.

"Yes, it was," a new voice agreed while Tsuna was busy looking flabbergasted. "Which is why I'd very much appreciate it if you and Sawada-san would relocate to a more...stable position."

"Masami-san!" Tsuna cried, but Takeshi didn't need the identification. The elegantly dressed girl leaning out of the window beside Kusakabe with burning eyes and a serenely lethal smile could be no one else.

Distantly, he thought that, okay, maybe there was some truth to those rumors after all.

A good amount of slowly inching along the net to an open window later, Takeshi was seated on a nice black sofa with a steaming cup of tea in his hands. Tsuna was sitting next to him, an apologetic smile on his lips but a relaxed line to his shoulders that said he was comfortable here, which was good enough for Takeshi.

"So, what is this place?" Takeshi asked, looking around curiously. It was pretty nice, actually, for a random room that Hibari had led them to, her mere presence dissuading any questions or protests in the hallways. There were even fresh flowers on the tables and everything.

Pretty expensive, if anyone asked him.

"This is the Reception Room," Hibari said evenly, moving to sit on the swivel chair behind the heavy oak desk with truly incredible amounts of paperwork. She took a moment to straighten up the desk before crossing her legs and pinning a calm gaze on them both.

To Takeshi's right, Tsuna went a bit pale. Takeshi couldn't exactly blame him, not that he would in the first place. Those eyes were scary.

"I," she started, clasping her hands in front of her, "would appreciate an explanation."

"I'll do it," Takeshi cut in before Tsuna could say anything because this mess should be laid solely at his feet. Tsuna frowned but didn't interrupt as Takeshi recounted the whole thing, skipping all the personal parts but still giving Hibari the gist of what had happened. When Takeshi was done, he paused and added, "Like I said, it's all my fault. I was really stupid. If Tsuna wasn't there, I would be dead. Sorry for all of the trouble I caused!" He bowed, careful to keep the tea in the cup. It wouldn't do for the hot liquid to spray over Tsuna.

When Takeshi was looking back at Hibari again, there was a thoughtful element to her frown, but he got the feeling that she wasn't very happy nonetheless. "There will be consequences," she said at last, "for disrupting the peace. As there should be."

That...didn't sound very good, but hey, at least she wasn't angry! Strangely enough, he was pretty sure that he wouldn't want to play with her when she was angry.

Tsuna gulped audibly. "W-What is it?"

Hibari just looked at him for a beat.

Tsuna cringed back. "Sorry, Masami-san."

Takeshi was lost. What had Tsuna done?

"I disapprove of uncertainty, Yamamoto-san," she explained, catching his confusion easily. "And as for the punishment..."

They both leaned forward in dreaded anticipation, the tension in the room rising swiftly. Takeshi held his breath.

"First, I expect Yamamoto Tsuyoshi to be informed of this incident within the day," Hibari said, ignoring how Takeshi frowned despite himself. "Yamamoto-san will also be suspended from playing baseball for eight weeks."

What!? Takeshi clenched his jaw so hard it hurt, the first instinctive denial blanking out everything else for a moment. His hands flexed, but — oh. His broken arm would take at least six or seven weeks to heal, so that was really just...

Takeshi grinned. "Thanks a lot, Hibari." For the stupid stunt he had pulled, she had let him off really easy. Pretty nice, in his opinion, considering her reputation. "I'll tell my dad myself, I promise."

Hibari inclined her head in majestic acknowledgment. "Please, call me Masami."

Takeshi laughed. "Sure thing, Masami!" In the corner of his eye, he saw Tsuna smile brightly, and it made Takeshi smile for real in return. Things had really turned out well this time around, huh?

"As for the second part of the punishment..." Without missing a beat, Masami gestured to the piles of papers littering the desk with an innocent look. "I'm sure it won't take long for this paperwork to be completed."

"Hieeeee!?"

Somehow, Masami was back in that annoying part of town again, knocking on Hayato's door. She sighed and wasn't at all surprised when the door was slammed open to reveal a dark scowl.

Truly, did this boy have no manners at all?

"What the hell are you doing here, maiko witch!?" Hayato snapped, already brimming with mistrust and hostility. He glared at her, the rudeness almost shocking.

Masami merely spread her fan open and brought it before her face, drawing on her impressive reserves of patience. She didn't say a word.

Hayato scowled even harder before something seemed to occur to him and he panicked. Loudly. "Is it Juudaime!? What happened!? Is Juudaime alright!? Spit it out already!"

He always had the most interesting reactions, she thought absently. "Sawada-san fell from the school rooftop today," she revealed and waited for the fireworks to start.

The drain of blood from Hayato's face was almost worrying. He even wavered on his feet, like he couldn't keep himself upright. "What!? Juudaime fell from the rooftop!? While I wasn't there!? Juudaime, I'm so sorry, I've failed as your Right-Hand Man! I'm not worthy! Oi, maiko witch, is Juudaime alright!? Tell me!"

Masami couldn't help but twitch when he grabbed her shoulders and started shaking her. Kyoya was hardly one for physical gestures, and Tsunayoshi was much too in awe of her to touch her so casually. It took honest effort to keep from going with her first instinct when faced with the unwelcome contact, which was to throw him down the stairs.

"Gokudera-san, please. Stop that," she stated, taking a step back and holding her fan between them as a barrier. "Sawada-san is quite alright. He's at the school right now."

The words had barely left her mouth before Hayato took off, leaving a literal trail of dust behind him. "Juudaime! I'm coming!" he shouted as he ran, almost getting run over during the process.

Masami stared after him. "Maybe I could have broken the news to him a bit gentler," she mused to herself, closing and locking his door for him. Then again — "My paperwork needs to look at least somewhat intelligent."

Even if she was quite good at it, all of the papers piling up on her desk made her uneasy for some reason, enough for her to make the decision to start dishing out mandatory work as part of detention. And if nothing else, Gokudera Hayato was very smart.

If a bit blindsided when the matter of Sawada Tsunayoshi came up.

"Masami."

"Yes, Onii-san?"

"What happened to the paperwork?"

"It was taken care of."

"...I see. Dinner?"

"Gyoza. And then dango."

"Hn."

Masami never bothered to go back and chaperone the boys, so she missed out on Hayato and Takeshi's first meeting. It didn't matter. She picked up on the animosity easily the first time she reluctantly detached herself from her duties to have lunch with Tsunayoshi again.

Then again, even the deaf, blind, and dumb would have been able to detect the rivalry humming in the air.

"Greetings."

"Yo, Masami!" Takeshi grinned at her, lifting a hand in greeting.

"You're here again, maiko witch?" Hayato scowled.

"Hahaha, what a weird nickname. I guess it fits though."

"Shut up, baseball idiot! No one asked you!"

"Masami-san!" Tsunayoshi beamed, so very open in his happiness that Masami wondered if Reborn would ever be able to teach this boy not to wear his heart on his sleeve. "You're free today?"

"Hai." Masami settled down a few meters away from the squabbling boys and sipped at her tea. "There's a test in English tomorrow. Are you adequately prepared?"

Tsunayoshi nodded, still a little tentative despite it all. "Yeah. I think so."

"Juudaime's perfect!" Hayato shot back less than half a second later. "Don't you dare belittle him!"

"Gokudera-kun, it's okay, Masami-san's just concerned about my grades..." Tsunayoshi squirmed in place.

"As she should be," Reborn said approvingly, appearing out of a hiding place in the wall — Masami made a note to investigate the school for any further changes he may have introduced — in a teacher outfit, complete with glasses and a pointer. "Your pronunciation is a disgrace to the Vongola."

"Hiieee! I told you, Reborn, I'm not going to become a Mafia Boss!"

"You're part of the mafia game, too?" Takeshi laughed, unperturbed. "That's great! Did the kid make you go through the entrance test? How did you do?"

"Entrance Test?" Masami repeated slowly.

"Don't worry, all of the damage was repaired," Reborn said, which wasn't reassuring at all. "There was no need to put Masami through the Entrance Test, Yamamoto. She's not in the Family yet." He shot a pointed look at Tsunayoshi, who frowned.

"Reborn-san!" Hayato protested loudly, glaring venomously at Masami to no avail. "You want the maiko witch to join Juudaime's Family!?"

"She's powerful," was Reborn's justification.

Hayato spluttered.

"...Sawada-san, perhaps we should review your English," Masami suggested, making the executive decision to ignore Hayato’s renewed ranting.

Tsunayoshi spluttered.

Quizzing Tsunayoshi while Hayato and Takeshi made nuisances of themselves in the background wasn't so difficult, even if it did give her a headache. Every now and then, Masami reminisced wistfully of the peaceful quiet of her elementary school days, when it was just her, her brother, and their sole friend.

Juggling all of these boys, while not entirely unwelcome, was taxing on her patience and energy.

Still, lenient or not, she drew the line when the dynamite came out again.

"A Sky can have six different Guardians: Storm, Rain, Lightning, Cloud, Sun, and Mist."

"Yes."

"Skies are incredibly rare, and they naturally draw in other Flames for Harmonization. Generally, Skies are at their most powerful when they have a full set of Elements, and vice versa. Characteristically, they are highly charismatic and influential and as such, are often in leadership positions."

"Correct."

"Do the Flames develop because of personality, or does personality develop because of Flame?"

"You would be better off asking a philosopher or a scientist that question. However, I can tell you that what few characteristics many people believe are associated with Flames are rather generic, much like your zodiac sign, for example."

"So they're a guideline, not a psychoanalysis. There can be deviations, based on gender, environmental factors, surrounding individuals, and unique circumstances."

"That's right. In addition, as people become more Flame Active, the general character traits of their Flame become stronger. Physical age is also a big factor. This is why Mafioso train their children; the younger they are, the easier they are to mold."

"So...as Sawada-san continues to mature and develop his Sky Flame, he'll become more...Sky-like."

"Yes."

She sighed.

"Hey, Masami!" Takeshi poked his head into the Reception Room with a bright grin. "Oh, sorry, am I interrupting something?"

There was a beat while Yachi, Arishima, and Odaka exchanged glances and collectively decided to return to trying to destroy the paperwork — sadly, it was never-ending — through the power of their glares alone.

It didn't seem to be working very well.

"Yamamoto-san." Masami looked up from the filing cabinet with a calm smile, automatically breathing through the tight ball of tension in her chest before it could manifest visibly. Four hours of continuous working didn't seem to be doing anything for her mood. "Is there something you need?"

"Nah," he said with an easy laugh. "We — me, Tsuna, and Gokudera, I mean — were going to go eat at my dad's place, TakeSushi. Do you want to come?"

Masami considered. It wasn't the first time she had been invited along on one of their excursions, though she had politely rejected most of their offers before, courtesy of the ever-increasing amount of work on her plate and her own desire to stay away from the noise and chaos that surrounded the trio. As for today...

On one hand, there was duty and obligation and paperwork. On the other hand, there was conversation and herbivores and anarchy. The former would only continue to grow if she neglected it now. The latter could probably level the whole town by accident. Which was the lesser of the two evils?

Arishima groaned, and there was a distinct thunk that indicated he had just dropped his head down onto his stack of paperwork, conveniently reminding her that Kyoya was out patrolling and the prefects were looking to her for instruction now.

With the herbivores it was.

"I believe I will," Masami decided, closing the cabinet. "Thank you for the invitation, Yamamoto-san." Gathering up her belongings quickly, she slung her bag over her shoulder and walked past Takeshi when he held the door open for her.

"No problem," Takeshi said, grinning. They strolled down the hallway, but before they could turn the corner, they both clearly heard the sigh of relief from behind them. Oh dear, that wouldn't do, now would it? Onii-san would be annoyed if he came back to find the herbivores lazing around.

She exhaled gradually through her nose in lieu of a sigh.

Masami smiled. "Excuse me for a moment." Ignoring Takeshi's curious glance, she turned on her heel and mimicked his earlier intrusion. "Before I forget" — all three of the prefects jumped a good meter in the air — "Yachi-san, Arishima-san, Odaka-san, three laps around the school, one hundred sit-ups, and forty push-ups today, please."

She paused. "And if you don't do it, I'll want to know why," Masami added and left again.

Takeshi was silent when she rejoined him, allowing the long, drawn-out groans of the perfects to echo down the hallway. However, when they were finally out of range, he burst into laughter. "Wow, you keep them on a tight leash, huh?"

Masami blinked guilelessly. "Your coach doesn't do the same?"

His laughter hitched slightly, and his eyes darted towards his cast, but when he looked back at her, Takeshi's eyes were clear and bright. "Yeah, sure, but not like that. He's not nearly as mean about it either."

"Yamamoto-san, I am the youngest, shortest, and lightest member of the Disciplinary Committee," she replied. "I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Hahaha, maybe, but I noticed you didn't say 'weakest' or 'nicest', right, Masami?"

Hmm, perceptive, she thought. Disregarding his depressive tendencies, Masami might actually enjoy talking with this herbivore. "It was implied," she said as they cleared the school doors and headed towards the gates, where Tsunayoshi and Hayato were waiting. "Greetings."

"Good afternoon, Masami-san," Tsunayoshi chirped back with a bow and a radiant smile, apparently in a fantastic mood today. Briefly, she was envious. "You're coming with us?"

"I decided my paperwork could wait a few more hours, yes."

"What, slacking?" Hayato scowled at her, not that that was new. "I thought you were supposed to be some super special, all-powerful secretary or something."

"Please don't exaggerate, Gokudera-san," Masami said as Takeshi began to lead the way. "If I was truly omniscient, I would hardly have so much paperwork."

"God forbid you ever become omniscient," Hayato muttered. "We would all be doomed."

Takeshi laughed. "That's not nice at all, Gokudera!"

"Shut up, baseball idiot! God forbid you become omniscient, too!"

Masami tilted her head, but she wasn't looking at the arguing duo. Sandwiched between the two, Tsunayoshi looked a tad overwhelmed, but he was grinning, his shoulders were relaxed, and his eyes seemed to glow with an inner happiness.

It didn't take a genius to see that he was much more content with how matters were nowadays. A Sky gathering his Elements, spreading his wings at long last.

She dropped back just a bit and hid her expression behind her fan. Her gaze drifted towards the horizon, where the sun was sinking and the sky was brilliant crimson, and she couldn't help but think that this silly boy wouldn't need her much longer.

"Onii-san, I don't suppose you'd be interested in Flames?" Masami brought up one night over dinner.

Kyoya glanced up from his bowl. "Flames," he repeated blankly.

She smiled. "Flames. Sawada-san's forehead lights up with an orange fire when he's shot by Reborn-san's bullet. That sort of Flame."

He chewed slowly on his udon and swallowed. "Did Otou-san tell you this?"

"Hai."

"So it's Mafia," Kyoya summarized.

"Mmm, yes."

He thought about it. "Can it be used as a weapon?"

Masami laughed lowly. "It's a Flame, Onii-san."

"Humph." He covered a yawn with his hand and finished the rest of his bowl before saying, "Tell me more."

It was raining.

Masami snapped her umbrella open and stepped outside of the protection of the school roof hesitantly. Instantly, the sound of raindrops hitting the black fabric sang through the air and vibrated down the metal to make her hand shake.

She sighed but a small smile quirked her lips. It smelled of fresh beginnings and cool ozone, and suddenly, it was so much easier to breathe. While she missed the thunder and lightning of a true storm, this was...nice. Summer showers were invigorating, in their own way.

Masami began the long trek back home, carefully avoiding the puddles already accumulated on the road. There was no one but her around, which made sense, seeing as how it was around eight in the evening and the rain had started an hour ago. It was rare for Namimori to receive such heavy downpour, and most of the citizens had already dashed away for cover.

Kyoya was already back home, seeing as she had been held up by the paperwork. The boys were…somewhere probably. Her neck ached, but her shoulders finally relaxed and her steps slowed.

The only sound in the streets was the clack of her boots on the wet concrete and the soothing sound of rainfall.

With the flood of water, the constant smog in the air and the dust on the buildings were being washed away. She hummed quietly to herself, occasionally bracing the umbrella against brief gusts of wind. Her bag was already damp, but she couldn't bring herself to care.

"Oi, Masami, is that you?"

Halting, she turned at the familiar voice. Standing near the supermarket's entrance, Takeshi grinned sheepishly at her, arm laden with plastic bags full of produce. He didn't have an umbrella, but with his bad arm, it wouldn't have mattered anyhow.

Masami breathed out a sigh, reining in the initial flash of irritation — her peace was going to be disturbed, it seemed, whether she liked it or not — and moved to meet her classmate. "Greetings, Yamamoto-san. Would you appreciate some assistance?"

He laughed. "Yeah, sorry. My dad wanted me to get some fish, but, well, the rain was a bit of a surprise. Mind giving me a trip back to the restaurant?"

"Of course not. Here, I'll take care of this." She took his bags from him and handed him her umbrella. "You're taller than I am."

"Huh." Takeshi glanced between them, somehow only seeming to notice now that he was 178 cm to her current 157. Really, she was shorter than Tsunayoshi without the boots. "Yeah, I guess I am."

She smiled and pretended she wasn't mildly annoyed. "There's a science test tomorrow, Yamamoto-san. Are you prepared?"

He laughed cheerfully as they began to walk, carefully trying to keep in-step with each other. "Nope," he said, popping the p. "Are you?"

"Yes," Masami said in a pointed 'of course' tone. But — "I do hope you realize your grade is borderline in that class?" It was like Tsunayoshi Take Two.

"How do you even know that?"

"Disciplinary Committee."

Takeshi sweatdropped. "Man...Hibari's pretty powerful, huh?"

She looked at him sideways slyly. "Did Sawada-san and Gokudera-san ever tell you about the time we indirectly fired Nezu-sensei?"

He spluttered for a second, only to light up with interest not long later. "No, how did that happen?"

By the time they were standing in front of the doors of TakeSushi, Takeshi was laughing helplessly, almost getting them both soaked when the umbrella wavered. "This Mafia Game is really fun, isn't it?" he said, gasping for breath.

"That's one way to look at it," she agreed as the doors slid open.

Yamamoto Tsuyoshi greeted them with a relieved grin and a towel in his hands. "Takeshi, there you are! I was getting worried."

"Sorry, dad," Takeshi apologized. "Hey, you've met Masami before. She let me borrow her umbrella."

"I can see that." Tsuyoshi turned to Masami with a kind smile. "Thank you for looking after my son, Masami-chan. Here, let me take that...and please wait here for a second." He grabbed the plastic bags and hurried back inside the restaurant, leaving her with the towel.

Masami looked down at the pale blue cloth and then at Takeshi. "Shall we switch?"

He laughed and obligingly offered her the umbrella, the two of them shielded from the rain by the eaves. "I guess it's not really necessary now, but..." He shrugged and rubbed the towel through his hair.

Tsuyoshi walked back out with a large wooden dragon-shaped container in his hands, the sushi inside placed both tastefully and artfully. "Please take this as a sign of our gratitude," he said, extending the gift to her.

Masami blinked, startled, but quickly recovered with a slightly warmer smile than usual. "Thank you very much."

When she got back home at last, she wasn't particularly surprised to discover the sushi was delicious. She decided to keep the wooden dragon as a decoration; it really was quite beautiful.

In hindsight, Masami really should have anticipated this.

But for some reason, when she opened her front door and found Tsunayoshi, Hayato, Reborn, and Takeshi standing outside, she was entirely unprepared.

All too self-aware, Tsunayoshi was staring at her with yet another deer-in-headlights look. Hayato was glaring sullenly at her, Reborn was smiling with glee, and Takeshi looked oblivious.

Inwardly, she grimaced, entirely unenthusiastic. A headache began pounding at her temples. This honestly wasn't something she wanted to deal with on one of her few days off. Outwardly, she bowed, tone coming out even, if dry, "Greetings."

"Ciaossu, Masami." Reborn was decked out in a samurai outfit today, boosting a kabuto that looked far too heavy for a baby.

"S-Sorry about this, Masami-san," Tsunayoshi said with a nervous smile, bowing back. He was already fidgeting in place as if psyching himself up for a dreadful biting.

"Just get on with it, maiko witch." Hayato scowled and sent dark looks at Takeshi from the corner of his eyes. It would be wonderful if he could ever tone down the aggression, but she wasn't holding her breath.

Takeshi didn't even seem to notice. That took true talent. "Yo, Masami! Wow, is this your house? It looks really cool!"

"It is, and thank you." Masami turned around, throwing over her shoulder, "Shoes off, please. Sawada-san, Onii-san's in a mood." Tsunayoshi went four shades paler. "Gokudera-san, cigarettes and dynamite are not permitted." Even without looking, she could feel the weight of Hayato's glare. "Yamamoto-san, welcome to the Hibari household."

"Hahaha, thanks!" Takeshi looked around curiously, carefully keeping his bad arm tucked to his side. "Hey, you guys are pretty traditional. My dad's like that, too, sometimes."

"We are a very traditional family," Masami agreed, stopping and turning in front of the dojo. "Sawada-san, Onii-san's waiting for you."

Hayato was very openly sulking now. "Juudaime, remember, you absolutely don't have to do this if you don't want to!"

"Eeh?" Takeshi scratched his head. "The kid said that you and Hibari were going to be playing a game. Is it dangerous?"

"Reborn!" Tsunayoshi complained, but Reborn just kicked him in the back, sending him flying through the door Masami conveniently opened at the right moment. "Hiiieeeee!"

"Herbivore, quiet — " they heard Kyoya snap before Masami closed the door with a firm click.

Masami snapped open her fan and considered the two boys over it. "Yamamoto-san, do you know how to fight?" she asked, because this was a difference between life-or-death in the world they were dabbling in. And, like Tsunayoshi, looking after the boy would be less of a hassle if he knew how to defend himself.

Takeshi looked blank. "No, not really?"

"Good idea, Masami," Reborn remarked. "Yamamoto, knowing how to fight is a special skill in the mafia game. You won't be able to win without it."

"Oh, really?" Despite his easy words, a spark of competitiveness lit up in his eyes and there was a new edge to his smile. "Guess I better learn quickly, huh?"

"You idiot, it's not that simple!" Hayato flared up, though his eyes never left the evil double doors currently blocking the sight of his precious Tenth from him.

"Excellent," Masami said, ignoring Hayato's outburst. "Right this way, please. Gokudera-san and I will be happy to teach you the basics."

Hayato's eye twitched. "Wait, what!? Don't go deciding things for me, maiko witch!"

"If Yamamoto isn't strong, then Tsuna's going to get hurt," Reborn said.

"Just you wait, baseball idiot! I'm going to make you the second best subordinate Juudaime will ever have!" Hayato declared passionately, eyes seeming to light up from the inside with the flames of his conviction.

"Hahaha, then who's the best?" Takeshi asked.

"Me, of course!"

"Nah, I think you switched the two."

"What did you say, baseball idiot!?

"He's a natural-born hitman," Reborn said to Masami, who was leading the two arguing herbivores to the second sparring room. "Just like you."

She hummed noncommittally. "And you?"

"Of course." Reborn smiled. "So you should know exactly how to train him."

Masami narrowed her eyes when Tsunayoshi burst into her office late one afternoon after school, babbling about bubble gum and pizza and bicycles. What in the world? Just how much trouble could one person get into?

"Sawada-san," she cut in smoothly and watched while he broke off mid-word and gasped for breath. "Please turn around, leave my office, remember your manners, and knock."

He gaped at her. Honestly, it was like all of her lessons flew right out of his brain when adrenaline hit. "But, Masami-san — "

"Now. If you wouldn't mind." She didn't relent, already tired from fighting her migraine.

Tsunayoshi's shoulders slumped, but he obediently turned and left, closing the door behind him. Half a second later, there was a polite knock.

Masami smiled, and if there was a measure of vindictiveness in there, then no one was around to comment. "Come in."

Tsunayoshi opened the door and stepped into the room meekly, bowing. "Hello, Masami-san."

She nodded. "Greetings, Sawada-san. Much better. Now, what would the problem be?"

He went paper-white in two seconds flat, gripping desperately at his hair. It was almost impressive. "There'sanItalianhitmanouttokillme!"

She blinked. Paused. "...slower, if you would."

Tsunayoshi took a deep breath. "There's an Italian hitman out to kill me!"

"I fail to see how that's new," Masami replied without batting an eyelid, signing a form and setting it in the 'done' pile. "If I recall correctly, the same criteria fits for Gokudera-san and Reborn-san, in a way."

He made a face at her, throwing himself down, face-first, on a nearby sofa. "Not like that, Masami-san! Bianchi really, really wants to kill me! And it's because of Reborn this time, too!"

"How so?" she asked dutifully, continuing to go through her paperwork. Her boot tapped restlessly on the floor in time with the slow violin music being played from the small radio in the corner.

"Apparently, Bianchi is Reborn's fourth lover. Lover! Does he even know what that word means!? I mean — " Tsunayoshi fumbled his words, gesturing violently with his hands. "Reborn's a baby!"

He's an Arcobaleno, she thought to herself, but said nothing. It wasn't her secret to tell. "And she wants to kill you because...?" Masami thought that Tsunayoshi, trouble or not, was a relatively likable boy, very much a so-called "Sky" when it came down to it.

Not that it appeared to be helping him at the moment. "Because she got this idea that I was chaining Reborn down or something and only killing me will free him!" Tsunayoshi wailed, burying his face into a pillow.

She paused in her work to flick an incredulous look at her classmate. Upon seeing that he was entirely serious, Masami sighed and wondered how someone could be so dense. "Sawada-san, do try and think things through for once."

He lifted his head up to pout at her, disgruntled and as adorable as a small fluffy bunny. She hid her amusement expertly. "What does that mean, Masami-san?"

"It means to stop and think," she scolded lightly, signing off another request and flexing her fingers. "From the sounds of it, this Bianchi-san is a seasoned, professional hitman, yes?"

"Yeah..." Tsunayoshi trailed off, head tilted.

Masami raised an eyebrow. "For one, if a true hitman attempted to kill you, Sawada-san, you would be dead." She ignored the small "hieeee!" this prompted. "For two, I highly doubt your tutor would actually allow you to be killed. For three, you're going to ruin that pillow soon."

He made a face at the last part but put the pillow he had been clutching to death down. "I'm not so sure about the Reborn-protecting-me part. Have you been paying attention to what Reborn's been making me do, Masami-san!? He's going to kill me himself! Bianchi isn't going to have to do anything!"

"Your death would result in him failing his mission," she pointed out. "And Reborn-san doesn't strike me as someone who tolerates failure."

"Hieee! That's a terrible reason!" Tsunayoshi protested, looking absolutely horrified.

Masami merely smiled and shrugged. Her foot continued to tap gently.

"Bianchi?"

"Yes." Because, regardless of what she had said to Tsunayoshi, assassins were to be treated with caution. Not everyone was protected by Reborn, and Masami was somewhat obligated to ensure her town would remain safe.

"She's the Poison Scorpion, a freelance hitman specializing in Poison Cooking. Don't ever eat anything she offers you."

"What would her connection to Reborn-san be?"

"Poison Scorpion Bianchi has been known to take missions from the World's Strongest Hitman."

"I see. Thank you for your assistance, Okaa-san."

The first thing Masami noticed about Bianchi was that her green eyes echoed Hayato's. Which, well, could possibly explain why he was in the corner, throwing up in a nearby trash can. Mafia Families tended to be a bit convoluted.

"Greetings," Masami said, bowing.

Bianchi flicked a sideways look at her from over the pot of simmering liquid she was stirring. The contents were not only purple but also emanating some very dizzying odors. "Who are you?" she asked. "Decimo's girlfriend?"

"No," Masami denied serenely as Tsunayoshi began choking on his own spit next to her. "I would be his classmate. And you're the hitman trying to kill him." Although, given Reborn's penchant for chaos, she was more of the opinion that the Poison Scorpion was here to play bodyguard, and the obsession with Reborn was a convenient cover.

"Masami-san — !" Tsunayoshi wailed at her bluntness, arms flailing.

Bianchi snorted, a wry smile curling her lips. "So I am. What are you going to do about it?"

Masami tilted her head and considered Bianchi closely. "Have you ever used botulinum toxin before?"

A spark of interest flared in the older woman's razor-sharp eyes.

"It looks like Masami likes poisons, too," Reborn commented to Tsunayoshi, sitting on the counter top with a gas mask on his face and dressed in a suit with the toxic sign on the front.

Tsunayoshi fainted. Whether that was from the vapors or the thought of Bianchi and Masami teaming up was anyone's guess. It didn't stop Hayato from pausing in his puking to yelp, "Juudaime!"

Bianchi eyed the unconscious boy and smiled, slow and lethal. "We'll talk," she said. "Personally, I like death heather better."

There was a new nurse at school.

Strange, how the old nurse had suddenly, accidentally, coincidentally caught a problematic illness and had had to be moved into a hospital far, far away from Namimori, dropping his position within five hours upon contracting.

And of course, it was a complete fluke that the new school nurse was a thirty-five-year-old pervert who liked to hit on females, refused to treat males, and was a renowned assassin who had apparently once saved Tsuna's life.

At Reborn's request.

Such a lovely stroke of luck, really. She was getting a little tired of coincidences.

Masami wandered into the Nurse's Room on a Thursday, right after school. The new nurse was in his office, and so she settled down on one of the very uncomfortable stools set out in disorderly rows to wait. There were several pamphlets free for the taking on the shelf.

Protect Yourself from STDs! one said. Wash Your Hands Correctly, another scolded. Don't Handle Your Depression Alone , the third advised. Keep Your Temper in Control, the last counseled.

Masami reached out and took five of the third and four of the last. Half a second later, the new nurse finally walked out and immediately beamed, two bright spots of color appearing on his cheeks.

"Hello, beautiful," Shamal, also known as Trident Shamal, according to her mother's contact, leered at her. "What's wrong? Are you hurt? Want me to kiss it better?"

"No, and no, thank you. Welcome to Namimori Middle, Dr. Shamal." Masami smiled and rose to her feet, gripping tightly onto her fan. "I'm afraid that the Disciplinary Committee has received some complaints about you as of late."

"Maa, I'm sure it's nothing to worry about," he drawled, shuffling closer to her while his eyes dipped far below her chin. "You really are quite stunning, you know. Now, about that kiss..."

She took a clear step back, smile never wavering. "Dr. Shamal, the school hired you for your capabilities in the field of medicine. If you cannot fulfill those duties, then please feel free to leave."

At that, Shamal paused at last, dark gaze sharpening as they drew back up to meet hers. "Come on, sweetheart, it can't be that bad," he coaxed, even as he leaned back, hands in his pockets.

"If you incite discomfort in the females of this school and refuse to treat the males, then there will be no need for you to remain as school nurse," Masami elaborated. "Please rethink your policies if need be and revise your behavior, or otherwise, resign."

With that, she spun on her heel, fighting the urge to slash the man's face open when he made some parting comment about her legs and how he adored strong-willed women.

It was almost as if, just for a second there, there hadn't been a flicker of lethal focus, an assassin's attention. Almost.

Well, now she supposed she knew who she was going to avoid for the rest of the school year if he actually stayed.

Before she closed the door behind her, Masami's eye caught on another stack of free pamphlets.

Give Up Smoking Today!

She ended up grabbing three of those.

"H-Hibari-san?" Tsuna squeaked. He had known immediately what Reborn was up to when he suggested using the Reception Room as their "mafia hideout," but protesting hadn't been of any use, as always.

Hibari sat on the back of a large black sofa casually, surveying the trio with obvious disinterest. "Omnivore," he greeted lowly. "Keep your voice down and get rid of your herd. I hate crowds."

Ignoring how Gokudera instinctively bristled on his left and Yamamoto shifted slightly on his right, Tsuna blinked and tilted his head to the side. The crowd thing wasn't new, but...he hadn't really been talking in a loud voice.

Catching sight of his confusion, Hibari scowled and shifted a fraction to the right, just enough for them to glimpse the girl asleep on the sofa behind him. Oh. Oh.

Tsuna took a step forward despite himself, eyes widening. "Masami-san?" She was sleeping beneath a thin blanket, one hand lying beside her peaceful face and black hair, still in her usual hairstyle, dramatic against the white pillow.

"What's the maiko witch doing, asleep at a time like this?" Gokudera demanded but kept his voice quieter than usual. "It's the middle of the day! What is she, a cat or something?"

"Hahaha, calm down, Gokudera." Yamamoto clasped a hand on Gokudera’s shoulder to his visible ire. He spoke quietly too. "Masami must be tired, yeah?"

"She's been busy dealing with the idiocy of your antics," Hibari explained carelessly. "If you herbivores wake my sister, I'll bite you to death. Leave."

Tsuna went still. Now that he thought about it, maybe Masami's smiles were a bit more strained than usual, maybe Masami had been more reserved and quiet than usual, but it was Masami so — so —

Had he really been bothering her?

(Later, when he would ask her, she would raise an eyebrow at him and inform him that he was being awfully self-centered. He would sputter and protest and believe her.)

"Why, you — " Gokudera cut himself off, evidently wanting to shout but knowing better. He glared helplessly at the unconcerned prefect, probably just itching to light up a dynamite stick.

As if reading his mind, Yamamoto warned, "Hey, Gokudera, don't get out your fireworks just yet, okay? You might wake up Masami, and that wouldn't be good."

"They're not fireworks, you stupid baseball freak!"

Spotting the murderous intent on Hibari's face, Tsuna winced and started to back away slowly. "Guys? Let's leave for now, alright?"

"Whatever you say, Juudaime!"

"Hahaha, alright, Tsuna!"

Disaster averted. Mostly. Hibari still ended up biting Tsuna to death during their spar later.

For the nth time that week, Hayato's damn sister was hanging around Juudaime, making more and more abominations of cooking. Naturally, Hayato had a duty as the Vongola Tenth's Right-Hand Man to protect his Boss, and unsurprisingly, he was throwing up in the corner yet again.

As it was, he was too busy fighting down the nausea to focus on anything other than the contents of his stomach forcing itself up his esophagus. In fact, he only really roused from his stupor when he was gently forced to sit down by two hands on his shoulders.

Daring to crack his eyes open, he was startled to see the clear blue sky above.

Bianchi was nowhere in sight.

Neither was... "Juudaime!" Hayato shot to his feet, but before he could take a step, his lack of balance caught up to him, and he wavered unsteadily.

"Easy," a familiar, irritating voice soothed, a hand wrapping itself around his wrist and yanking him down again. "Please. Sawada-san's just fine."

Hayato already knew who was sitting next to him on the curb of the sidewalk, but he turned his head to frown at Masami anyway. "Maiko witch, what the hell!?"

He didn't care how many people thought she was an angel; the glance she directed at him was clearly sardonic, even if her voice came out as pristine and sweet as always. "I'm sorry, would you rather I have left you back there with your sister?"

Hayato couldn't help but blanch at the thought, glaring at the amusement that twinkled in her eyes in response. "Oh, shut up," he muttered, resigning himself to the inevitable. Leaning back with a sigh, he got out a cigarette and lit it, blowing out a ring of smoke.

He didn't smoke around Juudaime, what with the risks of second-hand smoke, and he'd been trying to cut back recently, because his Boss had mentioned that it would be nice if Hayato could tone down the habit a little. The Tenth had even been kind enough to offer Hayato a brochure for quitting!

Not that Hayato would actually need it if he decided to quit, but he appreciated the gesture. No one had ever put so much personal effort into ensuring a worthless half-breed's safety, and he didn't want to disappoint his Boss.

Damned Bianchi was his exception to everything though.

Belatedly, Hayato noted Masami's disapproving stare. Which, no, he wasn't going to listen to her shitty criticism. "What? I'm not at school, I'm not at your house, we're outside! What more do you want, dammit!?"

She tilted her head, reaching up to fiddle absently with the white and purple flowers of her kanzashi. "You'll need to find a better way to light your dynamite," she said in an apparent non-sequitur.

He blinked. "What?"

"That's why you started smoking, isn't it? For a fast, convenient method to ignite your dynamite." She fanned herself absently with graceful, practiced twists of her wrist. "It's not foolproof, and it's unhealthy. Perhaps you might consider an alternative?"

Hayato hesitated, torn between yelling indignantly at his classmate and actually considering her words. It would have been easier if he could honestly say that she had no idea what she was talking about, but he couldn't. She had taken him out with those fans before, easily at that.

Besides, sometimes having a brain like his was annoying, because now that he considered it, she was right, damn it! It wasn't like Hayato didn't know the consequences of smoking, but Mafia, enough said.

He had never counted on living a long life.

"I assure you, a corpse has never been of any use to a leader, any leader, let alone a Mafia Boss.

Words the witch sitting next to him had said, said witch currently cloud watching almost dreamily. When she wasn't unfairly hitting Juudaime and nagging Hayato, she had a quiet presence, soft as the silk on her fans.

If you ignored the lethal iron designs crafted on them like an idiot, of course. He wasn't an idiot.

Hayato snorted. "Yeah, yeah, whatever." He got to his feet and walked away.

"Onii-san, where are you going?"

"The pole-knocking event."

"...why?"

"The pathetic herbivores in charge of leading team B and C are unconscious."

"...and?"

"There's a possibility I might be able to fight the baby."

"...have fun, Onii-san."

"Finish the paperwork."

"Hai, hai."

Somehow, it wasn't even a surprise to receive a panicked call from Tsunayoshi before the sun had fully appeared over the horizon. It was becoming a bad habit of his. She nonchalantly contemplated siccing Ryohei on him, but she actually found his complaints valid this time around.

"M-Masami-san! I-I th-think I just k-k-killed someone!" he shrieked through the receiver, sounding half hysterical and half neurotic. He was also whimpering under his breath and probably trying to tear his hair out. One of these days, he would succeed and become as bald as Mochida.

"...hmm," she muttered after a moment, overlooking the stuttering for once. To be honest, Masami had expected to have to deal with Kyoya's first kill before Tsunayoshi's. Impressively enough, her brother had managed to keep it to broken bones and deep bruises.

"MASAMI-SAAAAAAN!" Tsunayoshi cried, sniffing audibly. She wondered if he was crying already. Albeit it was for a good reason today, so perhaps she wouldn't reprimand him later.

"Calm down. I'll be there in five minutes. Breakfast isn't ready yet." Kyoya would hardly be impressed if Masami rushed out the door without finishing their meal at least. She had also been up until midnight last night finishing the last of her work, so Masami was still working through the last vestiges of sleep.

Tsunayoshi started crying.

"Hmm." Masami nudged the corpse lying prostrate on the ground thoughtfully, fan covering the bottom half of her face. "He does appear to be dead..." There was no breathing or heartbeat anyhow. Still...

"Wow!" Takeshi grinned, ignorant to the horrified looks directed at him from almost everyone else in the room. "This mafia game's so realistic, huh, Tsuna?"

There was a moment of silence.

Takeshi turned to look at his friend with a concerned furrow of his brow. "Tsuna?"

And...that seemed to shock Tsunayoshi out of his frozen state. Sadly.

"HIEEEEEEEEE!" Tsunayoshi screeched in despair, tears glinting in his eyes. She restrained the urge to wince at the loud noise. "My life is over! I should just turn myself into the authorities right now and go to jail!"

"C-Come on, Juudaime!" Hayato hastily reassured, looking rather discomforted himself. "I'm sure it won't be that bad! Reborn-san, can't you do anything?"

"Masami's already here, isn't she?" Reborn sipped at his cup of coffee calmly. "Can't you do something about this, Masami?"

Tsunayoshi, Hayato, and Takeshi spun around to stare at her like a trio of overeager puppies. It was as if they thought she was going to pull out a magical wand and wave it, thereby returning everything to normal. While it was somewhat flattering that they thought so highly of her, Masami found it more exasperating than anything.

Speaking of normal, that girl with brown hair...

"Sawada-san. Introductions, if you please." Masami curled her fan around and began to air herself with it, blinking at the other girl. Wasn't that the uniform of Midori Middle? At least someone here wasn't one of hers.

(Kyoya was the one who took people under his wing as easy as breathing, shouldered the burden of their safety, expectations, lives, hopes, and dreams without even seeming to notice. Masami wasn't like that, not really, for all that she was training his prefects and giving out orders in his absence and watching over three reckless idiots.)

"That's not the important thing here, you damn witch!" Hayato exploded, eyebrow twitching, but Tsunayoshi jolted upright, gulping hard as he realized what he had forgotten in his panic. The time she had spent drilling manners into him hadn't entirely gone to waste, it seemed. He just needed a little practice and some reminders, that was all.

"Ah! Haru, this is Hibari Masami. Masami-san, this is Miura Haru," Tsunayoshi said, looking between them nervously. "I'm sorry...this is a bad way for the two of you to meet…"

"No matter," Masami said calmly, sweeping out into a graceful bow. "Greetings, Miura-san. It's a pleasure to meet you. Do please call me Masami."

"H-Hahi! It's very nice to meet you, too!" Haru, looking a bit unsteady, bowed back. "Can you really help Tsuna-san with...this?" She gestured at the body, cringing.

Masami shrugged and let loose with her fan.

BAM!

"KYAAA! DAMN IT, THAT HURT!" The presumed-dead-thief jumped up, howling like a baby, hands gripping at the three-tiered lump that was blooming on the top of his head.

"There. Problem solved."

"Hieeeee!? He was alive, all along!?"

"Hahaha, apparently. Isn't this great, Tsuna?"

"There's nothing great about it at all, baseball freak!"

"What is the head of a branch of the Family?" Masami asked.

Tsunayoshi bit his bottom lip, rubbing absently at the developing bruise on his cheek. "Uhhh...a consigliere?"

"Incorrect. That would be the caporegime or capodecina, normally shortened down to capo," she read from the book Reborn had procured out of nowhere two Saturdays ago.

"Dame-Tsuna, you're pathetic," Reborn commented, sipping happily at his espresso. Masami was getting better at making Reborn's drinks to his taste; this one only took five tries while Tsunayoshi was slammed into the floor by Kyoya, and Takeshi ran around dodging bombs.

"I'm trying, Reborn," Tsunayoshi muttered, covering a yawn, the adrenaline rush probably close to wearing off. "I don't even want to be a Mafia Boss," he continued, softer this time like it was an afterthought.

They both ignored the latter comment, Masami because that honestly wasn't her concern and Reborn because he didn't care what his student wanted. "The consigliere is the adviser of the Family, Sawada-san," she explained.

"There's also the Outside Adviser, which would be CEDEF in the Vongola's case," Reborn said.

"What's that?" Tsunayoshi downed his cup of tea and slid it down the chabudai. Masami refilled it obligingly.

"It stands for—"

"No, no, no !" Hayato shouted from across the room. "It's mat-ii-ta , not maaa-tita!"

Takeshi only hummed. "Oh, so it's matita?"

"No, it isn't, you stupid baseball idiot! How the fuck are you getting this wrong!? It's the word for 'pencil', goddammit!" Hayato sounded like he was ready to tear out his hair.

"Hahaha, this Italian stuff is hard."

" — Consulenza Esterna Della Famiglia," Reborn said without missing a beat, the Italian rolling off his tongue with enviable ease.

"What's that?" Tsunayoshi repeated.

"The External Advisers of the Family."

Tsunayoshi huffed in exasperation. "What's that!?"

"Figure it out yourself, Dame-Tsuna," Reborn commanded ruthlessly. "We're not teaching you Italian and Mafia terms so you can slack off."

"Hiieee, how is this considered slacking off!?" Tsunayoshi flailed, almost sending his teacup off the edge of the chabudai.

Masami saved the expensive tableware with a sigh and a, "please be careful, Sawada-san."

"Hieee! I'm so sorry, Masami-san!"

Masami flipped through the papers, the click-clack of her boots on the pebbled path muted. Transferring schools, especially from Italy to Japan, was more complicated than you would expect. The paperwork it generated was considerable.

Adding the shadiness of the Mafia and Hayato's possibly forged documents into the mess only made it worse.

The idea of more paperwork was confining in a way she didn't want to look too deeply at.

"I seem to be coming here a lot," Masami said to empty air as she walked down the road to Hayato's apartment. Delivering all of these forms to him herself wasn't necessary in her opinion, especially since Hayato would most likely only end up yelling at her as usual, but the other options were worse.

Kyoya and Hayato still got along like oil and water, while any prefects she sent would probably be bombed to kingdom come. So here she was, playing messenger girl.

Masami shook her head, ignoring the cool touch of her kanzashi as they brushed against her cheeks with the movement. Walking up the stairs, she was lifting up a hand to knock on Room 37's door when she heard it: the faint, unmistakable sound of piano music.

Oh?

It had been a long time since she had the chance to listen to live music. She paused and, after a moment of thought, took a step to the right and turned around, leaning against the wall right next to the door. Flipping open her phone, she silently pressed the record function and settled down to listen.

Well-versed in classical music as she was, it took Masami only a few seconds to recognize Beethoven's Sonata Pathétique. It wasn't one of her personal favorites, but that didn't stop her from blowing out a quiet breath and closing her eyes. The slight burn informed her that she had been squinting at tiny print and reorganizing documents for far too long.

Quick, lilting notes danced in her awareness, followed by darker counterpoints, and it was easy to let herself forget about reality momentarily.

Masami hadn't played music since she was very young, under the guidance of her mother. She preferred dancing, but song and rhythm was her passion in general, and it didn't take a professional to recognize that Hayato was very, very good at playing the piano. Yet, she didn't recall ever hearing him mention the talent.

But then, she did remember seeing the shadow of a piano hiding around the corner on her first visit here.

She didn't know how long she stood there in silence, listening as he shifted seamlessly from one movement to the next. When he finally finished the last measure, dramatic and cascading, the last notes lingering in the air, the silence that returned seemed a tad suffocating.

Masami smiled, for once truly heartfelt and grateful, and left without knocking.

She would get these papers to him tomorrow in class.

"Masa-chan! It's great that you could join us today!" Kyoko sighed blissfully, hands clasped together. "Isn't this place just wonderful?"

"It is," Masami agreed, peering around at the small bakery her female friends had dragged her to. It smelled of warm, decadent desserts, all chocolate and vanilla and sugar. "Miura-san, have you been here before?"

"Yup!" Haru grinned, enthusiasm lighting up her face. "Haru and Kyoko-chan met here actually!"

Kyoko laughed. "We did! The cream puffs are amazing, by the way. Why don't you try one, Masa-chan?"

"Oooh, and we can get a custard for Hana-chan!" Haru clapped her hands, sneaking a glance at the table near the windows, where the other girl was holding the fort, so to speak.

Masami considered the desserts through the glass. "I wouldn't mind a slice of cheesecake, I suppose."

"You won't regret it!" Kyoko promised cheerfully, leading the way to the counter. About to follow, Masami was deterred when Haru sidled up next to her, angled away from both Kyoko and Hana, a sheepish look appearing on her face.

"A-Ah...Masami-san...?" Haru fidgeted with her hands, shifting her weight from one foot to the next.

"Yes, Miura-san?"

"W-Well, you know about Tsuna-san and the whole" — she lowered her voice to a whisper, glancing furtively around — "Mafia thing, right?"

Masami wondered what Reborn was thinking, bringing a civilian girl into this mess. "That would be correct."

"Do you think that Haru...would be a good wife for Tsuna-san when he becomes a Mafia Boss?" Haru asked hesitantly, eyes wide and hopeful.

Masami really wondered what Reborn was thinking. Later, when she was walking back home and an explosion went off in the far distance, she consoled herself with the fact that the cakes had, in fact, been delicious.

There was something to be said for relaxation.

Masami threw open her window and closed her eyes for a long moment. It was after midnight, she was in a white yukata that served as a nightgown, her fans were by her bed, her hair was down, and she could finally just be herself without any pretenses.

Even with Rika's training, even with Masami's composure and self-control, she had been pushing it recently. Ever since Reborn, the harbinger of anarchy, had descended upon Namimori, if she was being honest.

Masami sat on the ledge and took ten minutes to simply breathe and twenty minutes to meditate, easing her frazzled mind back into something resembling order. Her bare legs dangled absently over her meticulously kept garden, and the wind pulled playfully at her hair.

It would be so very easy to follow that call, to move and run and fly. But Kyoya, and the Committee, and Tsunayoshi —

She blew out a breath and steeled herself. Masami opened the notebook in her lap and spun a pencil between her fingers. She recorded a methodical narrative of her day. She made notes about the state of her school, the mood of her brother, and the relative level of insanity in her town.

Then, Masami turned to the pages on the three people that a charitable person would call her problematic friends, her brother would call her unruly pets, and who she simply called hers.

She sighed, long and deep.

If a stranger could see the three systematic profiles she had down on paper, they would have probably been disturbed. It wasn't exactly common for middle school girls to methodically take apart their associates' psyches and write them down on paper like some bizarre psychological report.

Masami just staunchly believed in knowing the people around her, inside and out. Strengths could be boosted, weaknesses could be exploited, and behavior could be manipulated, if she so chose. If asked, she would blame Hibari Rika for hammering an assassin's paranoia into her since childhood.

Tsunayoshi was the first and the easiest to understand, as much as any human being could be.

Way back in fifth grade, Masami had watched him for less than three days before being able to grasp the majority of his virtues and flaws, as well as the holes she could patch up by pulling a string here and pulling a string there if she wanted to expend that effort.

Granted, Tsunayoshi had changed since those days, just as everyone did, and so, she had made corrections to his profile, but as the saying went: some things changed, and some things stayed the same.

He was kind, open, and generous. He was timid, fearful, and meek. He attracted attention, both good and bad, as easy as breathing. He was often overwhelmed by unusual events in his life — which happened daily — and would rather stand up for his friends than stand up for himself.

He had…a strength of will hidden deep down inside that few could match when push came to shove.

Naturally, Hayato was far more complicated.

He was intelligent and pragmatic. He was passionate and unreasonable, prone to bursts of temper and irritation. He was a scientific genius but believed in aliens and the supernatural. He was enthusiastic and zealous but also pessimistic and suspicious.

He pushed everyone but Tsunayoshi away, stubborn to a fault and just as belligerent. While he was expressive, Hayato wore his harder, more negative feelings on the outside, while concealing everything soft and vulnerable on the inside.

Masami could and had pegged down his obvious issues easily: smoking, overuse of dynamite, short temper, and lack of self-regard. That had been clear-cut enough. The more important dilemmas were less palpable and far more perplexing.

There was a need to prove his worth that translated into reckless, excessive actions. There was a desire to make a name for himself, carve out a niche in the world with force and fire. There was an obsessive devotion to Tsunayoshi, and an all-consuming goal to become the Right-Hand Man of the Vongola Decimo.

To make things worse, more recently, the matter of his sister, the vomiting, and the piano had come up. It was a good thing she liked puzzles, or she would have washed her hands clean of him a long time ago.

Takeshi was only slightly better.

He had only come along recently, so Masami didn't have much data on him, but if Tsunayoshi was an open book, and Hayato was layered like tree bark, then Takeshi's life was a masquerade. He hid behind his smiles and laughs like they were a veil, all the while honing the edges that made Reborn call him a 'natural born hitman'.

Which, interestingly enough, gave Masami a bit more insight because Reborn had also called her the same thing. Reborn deflected as well, relying on absurd antics and casual turmoil to divert attention from how very dangerous he was at the heart of his nature, from the power and skill that made him the World's Strongest Hitman.

Masami wondered if all natural born hitmen used one shining, distracting facet of their personality to cover up the rest of them, the parts of them that were dark and cold and not meant for the light of the sun.

Takeshi was friendly, easygoing, and cheerful. He was also focused, perceptive, and instinctive. Masami had watched the sessions between Takeshi and Hayato, witnessed how the former had improved in leaps and bounds while advising the latter on how to progress as well.

This boy knew who he was, knew what he wanted to do, knew how to do it, and knew how to play it all off with a laugh and a joke. That took talent and a certain internal balance most people lacked. Indeed, if it hadn't been for the rooftop incident, Masami would have written him off as more stabilized than even Tsunayoshi and called it a day.

But of course it wasn't that easy.

So. Another subordinate, another puzzle. Unlike Hayato, Takeshi wasn't reckless or over-the-top in everyday interactions, but from what he had said on the rooftop, he had suffered from a loss of equilibrium. He needed something to cling onto, just as Kyoya needed to fight and Masami needed to dance.

For the moment, however, he appeared to have foregone his maniacal dedication to baseball in favor of fixating on Tsunayoshi, which...now that she thought about it, was becoming rather common. She hadn't made up her mind as to whether or not she should interfere yet. Was this normal Sky-Element behavior? Or was it something else?

Was it possible that even she had decided to take Tsunayoshi under her wing in fifth grade because her subconscious knew he was a Sky? It was an uncomfortable notion on a bone-deep level. She made a note in the margins of his page for future reference.

Past Takeshi's page was one on herself and then one on her brother. Those she didn't bother looking at, because she already had them memorized right down to the last word. Then, there was Reborn, which...just...no.

Masami took a deep breath and closed her eyes, covering a yawn. "Verdict?" she muttered into the quiet of night. "We are all terribly unsettled by society's standards."

The open road beneath her feet whispered, and she wanted to answer.

Chapter Text

Czárdás: a traditional Hungarian folk dance characterized by a tempo that crests from very slow to quite fast.

When Masami first heard of the little boy with the afro running around the school in a cow suit, she didn't even hesitate before tracking Tsunayoshi down.

It seemed like all of the insanity in Namimori had something or another to do with him recently, which was awful, considering how small and stifling the town already was. Well, it had more to do with Reborn, but since he stuck to Tsunayoshi all the time it was practically the same thing.

Honestly.

"Eeeh? Lambo?" Tsunayoshi smiled sheepishly, scratching his head. "He's this five-year-old hitman from the Bovino Family that showed up at my house one day. Then, my mother took a liking to him, and…"

"He hasn't left," Masami concluded, leaning against the window of the empty classroom. She tapped her tessen against her arm lightly, breathing through the thrumming tension beneath her skin.

"Yeah. Sorry, he's a bit of a handful and he keeps on causing trouble, but I think he's a good kid." Tsunayoshi fidgeted in place, casting a hesitant glance at her as if waiting for judgment. As if that was in any way helpful.

"Is he a part of your Family now?" she asked, looking over her shoulder to take in the crowd of students leaving school grounds. Takeshi was at baseball practice today, and Hayato was stocking up on his bombs. Again. She really didn't want to know where he was using them up.

"I...I guess?" he replied. "I mean, Mom really likes him, and Lambo's pretty annoying but he doesn't have anywhere else to go, and — "

"If he's a part of your Family, Sawada-san, then take responsibility please," Masami chided, straightening up in preparation for returning home. "You know what the rules are here."

Don't aggravate Hibari Kyoya.

Tsunayoshi winced, rubbing absently at a bruise on his right side. There had been a hole in his defense last Saturday and Kyoya hadn't hesitated to take advantage. "Okay, Masami-san, I'll try. I'll see you tomorrow?"

"Hai. See you later, Sawada-san."

"See you later, Masami-san."

Tetsuya had always admired many things about the Hibari Siblings.

First was their strength. As a weak, feeble elementary school student down on his knees in the dirt in front of three of the older kids, head bent to hide the tears running and hands scraped, Tetsuya had known the value of strength. When Kyoya had come swooping in like some vengeful bird of prey, mouth bared in a bloodthirsty smile and tonfa flashes of light, Tetsuya had looked up and pledged himself to the boy without hesitation. He hadn't ever regretted that decision.

Masami was strong, too, but hers was a different sort of strength. To this day, Tetsuya had only seen Masami fight once or twice at most. Violence wasn't how Masami solved most of her problems.

She could. But she chose not to.

Rather, Masami possessed an insidious strength. She understood how to deflect and manipulate, and the value of a little bit of steel here and there. When faced with an authority figure, Masami smiled and talked and was home free in minutes.

Second was the autonomy between the siblings. There was something to be said for being allowed to go your own way, yet forever know that someone would be there to back you up if you needed it.

And third was their independence. They did whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted. True, Kyoya used his independence to take naps and Masami took duty cripplingly seriously, but that wasn't the point.

However, sometimes, all three could be endlessly frustrating.

"Masa-san." Tetsuya stood in the doorway and glanced at the clock hanging on the wall to the right. It was ticking past five-thirty, and still, Masami sat at her desk, head bent over yet another form on budget cut and damage expenses.

Really, all of this work should be going to the Principal, but neither Kyoya nor Masami trusted that man with much of anything after the Nezu Incident.

"Greetings, Kusakabe-san." Masami didn't look at him, preoccupied with the form. She made a note before signing it with a well-practiced flourish and placing it off to the side, where a substantial stack had already accumulated. "What can I do for you?"

He hesitated, trying to feel his way through the minefield he was attempting to navigate. Tetsuya might have been with the Hibari Siblings for longer than anyone else, his knowledge of their ways unsurpassed — for an outsider, that was — but they had a habit of being unpredictable at the worst of times. "School let out hours ago."

"Hmm...yes, it did."

"All of the teachers have left." The last one, a particularly diligent history teacher, had left at five o'clock, to be exact.

Masami signed another paper and put it aside. "So they have." The stack to her left wasn't looking any smaller.

"Officially, no one is meant to be in the school building at the moment."

"No, I suppose not."

Tetsuya suppressed a sigh and concluded that the tactful and subtle method wasn't going to work. "Masa-san, please go home."

"The Principal isn't going to kick me out, Kusakabe-san," she said with only the slightest undertone of dry amusement, giving every impression of completely missing his point.

He knew better than to fall for it. "The paperwork will still be here tomorrow."

"That is the point." She tucked an errant strand of long black hair behind her ear and frowned slightly at the form in front of her.

"You've been staying after school for the past four days. This isn't healthy."

Masami breathed a sigh and raised her eyes at last to meet his gaze. "Thank you for your concern, but I am quite alright. Once I finish with this pile, I will return home and get some rest. Please do the same, Kusakabe-san."

And, apparently, the matter was closed. Tetsuya rubbed at his forehead and wished Kyoya would interfere. Sadly, both of them were stubborn as mules when their minds were made up.

Kyoya looked up with a raised eyebrow when Masami entered the room with a lidded box in one hand and wrapping paper in the other. She set both down on the table and retrieved some tape.

"Masami."

"Hai?"

"What are you doing?"

"Wrapping a gift."

"For?"

"Sawada-san."

Kyoya blinked as Masami began to carefully go through the gift wrapping process. "It's the omnivore's birthday?'

"In two days." She paused for a moment and shook her head. "Although, I believe Reborn-san's birthday is tomorrow. They're throwing a party for him."

He grunted, disdainful of herbivores and their crowding. While he knew his sister didn't often mind, even she had her limits. And those limits had been retreating more and more each day now. "Will you be going?"

"No," Masami denied serenely, cleanly ripping off a piece of tape. "I'll offer Reborn-san a gift, of course — it's only polite — but I see no reason to attend his birthday party."

"And the omnivore?" Kyoya didn't...mind the boy as much as he did the other herbivores, but there were few people he was willing to go to the extent of buying a gift for.

Sawada Tsunayoshi was not one of them, even if he was important to Masami.

"I don't enjoy parties," she murmured, finishing the wrapping neatly and starting to gather up the materials. "However, I will give Sawada-san his gift and wish him a happy birthday."

He nodded and went back to drinking his tea. Such effort from his little sister in regards to a small omnivore was more than sufficient.

Should Sawada Tsunayoshi not appreciate it, Kyoya would simply downgrade him back into a herbivore. And perhaps bite him to death a few more times.

"Greetings, Sawada-san."

Tsuna looked up, already smiling abashedly. Masami stepped into his hospital room lithely with a bow, holding a beautifully wrapped box in her hand. She looked very unimpressed.

"Good morning, Masami-san," he said, blushing. "I'm really sorry you had to go through all of this trouble just to see me…"

"There's no need to worry about it," she said, gliding forward. "I'm rather more concerned with how you got yourself injured the day before your birthday, Sawada-san."

Tsuna laughed, shifting in the uncomfortable sheets. "Weeeeell...that has a lot to do with Reborn actually. He shot me, and I ended up twisting myself into a pretzel. Somehow. It's okay, I'll be fine in a couple of days. "

"I don't believe I'm surprised," she informed him, placing his gift on his bedside table. "Nonetheless, happy birthday, Sawada-san. Congratulations. And get well soon."

"Yeah." Tsuna smiled, happy and content even though he was sore beyond what should have been physically possible. Even his mother had forgotten his birthday, so the fact that distant, aloof Masami had not only remembered but had also gotten him a gift and visited in person... "Yeah, thank you so much, Masami-san."

The back of her hand brushed against his in gentle acknowledgment before she saw herself out.

Tsuna smiled like a goof for the rest of the day. Reborn didn't even kick him for it, although he still had to finish his homework. He would keep this memory close to his heart. That, and the wilderness survival kit she saw fit to give him, considering how sadistic his home tutor was.

There was a Storm Arcobaleno standing on her doorstep. Again.

Masami inwardly sighed and outwardly smiled. It seemed like she had been doing that a lot lately. "Greetings, Fon-san," she said, sweeping a respectful bow. "Would you like to come in?"

"Very much so." Fon smiled placidly at her, oddly similar to her mother and herself now that Masami was looking for it. "How have you and your brother been, Masami?"

"Well, I suppose," she said, preparing a pot of tea as was custom in this household. "What brings you to Namimori?"

It wouldn't happen to be a Sun Arcobaleno or a Vongola Decimo, would it? was what she really wanted to say, but that would hardly be polite. It would also show too many of her cards too soon.

"My apprentice has a job here," Fon replied, seating himself in seiza on one of the zabutons. "But she's young and I didn't want to leave her without supervision."

Considering that Fon was a part of the Chinese Triads, this 'job' sounded rather suspicious. And in the Mafia, 'young' tended to be children under ten. Such a mess.

"I see," Masami said, pouring the boiling hot water into an old teapot. "I wasn't aware that you had an apprentice, Fon-san."

He smiled, calm as a still lake. "It's a new thing." And, most likely, not something he'd like to advertise, with his reputation and enemies. "She's very good, though, very talented. A wonderful apprentice."

"And her target?" If it was Tsunayoshi, all bets were off. Kyoya would agree with her on this; Tsunayoshi was a student of Namimori after all. "Perhaps I might know of him or her."

Fon paused, gazing up at her with perceptive dark eyes. Masami refused to flinch away. There were few people she was willing to back down for. Granduncle or not, the Storm Arcobaleno was not one of them. Power or strength had nothing to do with it.

Fon nodded after a moment as if she had passed a test and said, "Okanaya Tsunesaburo."

Masami considered the name for a long minute and shook her head, taking care not to let her tense shoulders relax or give off any other tell. "Forgive me, but I have no recollection of this man."

"There's no problem." He was unmoving even as a small Chinese monkey sprang from Fon's hood and moved onto the table to stare at her with round eyes. "This is Lichi, my partner. Would you happen to have some fruit or nuts for him?"

"Certainly." Masami smiled at Lichi, petting his head for a second before rising to her feet for the treats. He really was very cute, even if the Storm Arcobaleno brought with him was more trouble than he was worth.

Now...what to do about the child assassin running around Namimori?

"Fon-san, do you foresee any problems that may arise from this arrangement?" Masami questioned as she returned with a tray of clementines and hazelnut.

Lichi chattered excitedly until she placed the tray on the chabudai and he could pounce on it, stuffing his mouth at the speed of light so his cheeks bulged.

Fon looked thoughtful even as he frowned subtly at Lichi in warning. "I-Pin is very shy," he said at last. "And she has terrible vision, extremely nearsighted. Otherwise, I see no complications."

"...I see. Will you be staying here, Fon-san?" He was family, even if the Hibari version of 'family' was rather different from the normal definition. Although, to tell the truth, the prospect of one more person she would have to keep an eye on was...aggravating.

She clamped down on the impulse to do something quite rash.

"No, I'll have my own accommodations." He smiled reassuringly. "Kyoya still dislikes me, does he not? I do not wish to strain the atmosphere in your lovely home."

Masami said nothing to that, which was a confirmation in and of itself.

Standing on the rooftop a day later, Masami watched, blank-faced, as Takeshi threw the Human Bomb high up in the air and I-Pin exploded.

Literally.

Shy. Nearsighted. Explosive.

Add those three factors together in a small little girl and a good chemistry student would get a highly volatile mixture.

"No complications, hmm?" Masami sighed and then darted forward to catch the falling child before she could get hurt. She almost wanted to fling everyone off the roof herself. "Sawada-san, Yamamoto-san, Gokudera-san, paperwork. After school. If you please."

"Again!? But it wasn't even my fault this time!"

"Hahaha, let's work hard and finish quickly, alright?"

"You maiko witch, how dare you make Juudaime do paperwork!?"

"Doing paperwork is good training for a Mafia Boss, Dame-Tsuna."

"I'm not going to become a Mafia Boss, Reborn! Hiiieee! That hurts! Stop it!"

"Excuse me?" Masami smiled politely at Kamisaka, who, even with the support of Ibu and Tsuga, was shaking, face pale as snow. It might have been because of the mildly homicidal glint in her eyes. "Would you please repeat that?"

"Uhhh...well…that is…" Kamisaka swallowed heavily and probably would have dithered on some more had Ibu not jabbed his elbow into his gut. Hard.

"There's been a report of two dozen men in black suits surrounding the Sawada household, Masami-san," Tsuga explained without batting an eyelid while Kamisaka bent over with a grunt. "Several of them appear to be armed."

It was common now for the more dangerous pieces of information to go through Masami or Tetsuya before they found their way to Kyoya. Fewer people got injured that way. Supposedly.

Masami folded her hands on the desk before her, lips pursing. Black suits. Sawada household. Why, it wasn't as if the Mafia didn't cater to stereotypes, she supposed. "Please don't interfere," she said semi-affably, spinning her chair around and rising to her feet. "I'll take care of this."

"Hai!" they replied in unison, snapping their hands up for a salute. She wondered briefly what exactly Tetsuya had been teaching them before dismissing the thought.

In her humble opinion, it was simply a bit too early for the Mafia to intrude on Namimori's peace, Vongola Decimo or not.

There were, indeed, far too many black-suited men surrounding the Sawada household with harsh faces and sharp eyes and hidden guns.

It was a good thing Masami hadn't been in the mood to interact with Sawada Nana anyhow.

She wasn't exactly in the mood for breaking and entering today either — perhaps she would ask for a dance with her brother later — so she flipped open her cell phone and put in a call. While she waited, Masami closed her eyes and focused on centering herself, muffling any lingering vexation beneath her usual composure. It wouldn't do to meet the Mafia with anything less than complete poise.

It took longer than normal. She would have to meditate longer than usual tonight.

"Hello?" Tsunayoshi answered after two rings. He sounded more curious and resigned than frightened, an encouraging sign if she had been looking for one.

"Sawada-san. Would you like to explain why there is a crowd of Mafioso surrounding your home?"

"Hiieee! Masami-san knows? How!?"

Silly, silly Tsunayoshi. "Never mind that. Please remove yourself from your house and escort me through your pseudo-bodyguards. We have much to talk about, I believe."

Through the phone, Masami heard him swallow hard. Smart boy. "I'll be down in a second."

"I'll be waiting."

True to his word, not five minutes later, Tsunayoshi was opening his door and looking around futilely. One of the Mafioso even came up to him to ask if anything was wrong — he was so dreadfully obvious.

Masami resisted the urge to sigh and obligingly stepped into view. Not five seconds later, every head in the vicinity snapped around to stare at her, some threateningly, some curiously, and more than a few hands dropped to hidden weapons.

How unsubtle. Her fingers flexed.

She ignored them all to smile at Tsunayoshi and bow. "Greetings, Sawada-san," Masami said, spreading her fan open to cover the bottom half of her face.

Tsunayoshi swallowed hard, but, after a quick glance around at the friendly but watching Mafioso, smiled back, warm and kind and in-control, and bowed back. "Good afternoon, Masami-san. Please come in."

Her fan nicely concealed her satisfied smile as Masami swept past the bodyguards and into the Sawada household. So those lessons in Mafia Etiquette and Boss Behavior after training sessions with Kyoya were useful after all. Good to know.

"If I may inquire as to what is happening, Sawada-san?" she murmured once they were out of earshot, turning to look at him at the bottom of the staircase.

"There's someone named Dino in my room," Tsunayoshi offered tentatively. "He was Reborn's last student, and he says he's here to meet me, 'cause, you know, I'm supposed to be the Vongola Decimo. He's the Boss of the Cavallone Family, and these are all of his men."

"Please don't sound so unsure when giving a report," Masami advised, gesturing with her fan for him to go up before her. The Mafia was essentially a series of dominance plays, and it wouldn't do for Tsunayoshi to look weak. "Did you give a good impression?"

He visibly restrained a wince. "I think? I mean, I didn't trip or anything...and when they started picking on me, I stood up for myself. He's pretty nice, actually, after I got over the whole people-in-suits-outside-and-inside-my-house thing."

Hmm, not bad progress, but...she raised an eyebrow, prompting Tsunayoshi to stop at the top of the stairs. "He's Mafia, Sawada-san," Masami reminded him. "Nice or not, he is, and has remained, a Boss of a Family for a reason."

Tsunayoshi sighed, drooping. For all of Masami and Reborn's efforts, his heart remained the same, soft and kind and much too vulnerable. "I know," he said glumly. Reaching out to twist his doorknob, he stopped abruptly and cast a searching look at her. "I-Is there anything I should — " He gestured wildly, but she understood.

"There's no need," Masami said but smiled nonetheless. It was always amusing and somewhat endearing when Tsunayoshi attempted to protect her, ignorant to how truly involved the Hibari Clan had been in the Underworld for longer than he had been alive. "Please, go ahead."

Tsunayoshi nodded, frown still worried, and opened his door to reveal yet more black-suited-men. They parted obligingly when they saw him, revealing a blond with tattoos sitting like a king on his throne in the middle of Tsunayoshi's bedroom, Reborn drinking tea by the table next to him.

...how presumptuous.

"Hey Tsuna, who's this?" Dino asked with a smile. It wasn't necessary. Even with the facade of charm, Masami could pick up on the cool calculation lurking behind the mask. 'Nice', indeed. "Is she your girlfriend?"

Tsunayoshi spluttered incoherently, and Masami resisted the urge to sigh. "G-G-G-Girlfriend!?" he squeaked. "N-No, o-of course not! Masami-san's definitely not my girlfriend! Not at all!"

"Hmm, me doth think the boy protests too much," Dino teased, obviously enjoying Tsunayoshi's flustered state.

"You should be happy you have such a talented girlfriend, Dame-Tsuna," Reborn added, deadpan.

"Eeeeeh!? Not you, too, Reborn! You know it's like that between me and Masami-san! She's not my girlfriend! We're just friends! Good friends, but not like — like that — !" Tsunayoshi rambled on, face going more and more crimson by the second and arms waving like noodles.

As entertaining as the sight was, Masami cut in before Dino could find any more ammunition. "Sawada-san."

Tsunayoshi shut up. With the fan obscuring her face, Masami purposefully didn't give him any cues to work with, but he wasn't stupid, regardless of some of his test scores. "Ah, right, sorry," he said. "Dino-san, this is Hibari Masami, my classmate. Masami-san, this is Dino, the Tenth Boss of the Cavallone Family."

"Greetings." Masami bowed with a cordial smile, never taking her eyes off of Dino. "Welcome to Namimori."

"It's a pleasure to meet you," Dino said, smiling and dipping his head back. "Are you a part of Tsuna's Family?"

"Not yet," Reborn piped up. "We're working on it."

"Reborn, we've talked about this!" Tsunayoshi frowned, forehead creasing. "I'm not going to become a Mafia Boss! And stop dragging my friends into this!"

Dino burst out laughing. "Ahhh...I guess you are a little like what I used to be," he said, wiping the tears from his eyes.

"Eh?"

"In the beginning, I thought the Mafia Boss could go eat sh — "

Masami snapped her fan shut, the sound both loud and ominous.

Half a second later, Reborn leaped up from his seat and punched his former student in the face. "Don't be vulgar in front of ladies."

"Ow...!" Dino grimaced, rubbing at his cheek. "You haven't changed at all, Reborn!"

"Dino-san!" Tsunayoshi gaped, looking half-concerned and half-disapproving. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. It's okay, I'm used to this! Hahaha, and I guess you are, too..."

Masami sighed and opened her fan again. "Dino-san," she said when it looked like the man might start blabbering again, "I wish you the best of times in this town."

He blinked, startled. "I...thank you...?"

She smiled, sweet and sharp, and rose to leave. At the door, Masami added casually over her shoulder, "Please remember that I'm counting on you to make sure Namimori remains safe and untouched."

She closed the door behind her. Somehow, she wasn't in the least surprised to hear reports of a gigantic turtle tearing up the Sawada household later. At least they contained the damage.

"They're yakuza called the Momokyokai that have some influence over the area here," Reborn explained. "Yakuza are Japanese Mafia. You middle school students won't stand a chance against them. Leave it to the police."

"Like hell I'd leave it to them!" Gokudera growled, running off at top speed like the hotheaded, if eager, amateur he remained.

"I'll leave the cops to you, little boy," Yamamoto called over his shoulder, not even a step behind.

Reborn looked after them with satisfaction before turning to Masami, who hadn't moved a muscle. Her fan hid the bottom half of her face, but he didn't miss the faint amusement in her eyes, nor the spark of something feral behind her ladylike exterior. "You're not going to go after Tsuna?"

"That was Dino-san's whip."

A familiar laugh sounded behind them and a sneaker tapped down beside Reborn. "Okay, you got me." Dino grinned at Masami, bright and curious, as a bound Tsuna was dropped to the ground behind them. "What would you have done if you hadn't known that, though?"

"Nothing," Masami replied. "The Yakuza know better than to touch Sawada-san."

Reborn observed how Tsuna winced, as if at some unpleasant memory, and couldn't help but wonder. He meant it when he said that Masami and Yamamoto were natural-born hitmen, even though he knew that his soft-hearted student didn't like to hear the truth, but the two of them were also different and he was well aware of it.

On one hand, Yamamoto had the sheer talent, instincts, reflexes, and determination. He had managed to dodge Reborn's shots, Gokudera's bombs, and the Bovino's grenades all at once, while dragging Tsuna along with him, as practically a civilian.

Masami, on the other hand, had the mind, the attitude, and the perspective. Her thought processes were methodical, her actions were efficient, her reasoning was clear-cut, her morals were shady, and she schemed but didn't hesitate to use violence when necessary.

Granted, they had both been conditioned in some way before Reborn found them. Yamamoto was an athlete, had been training with his own special brand of focus for a good amount of time, while Masami's mother, Hibari Rika, was an assassin who had probably trained her daughter from birth.

That didn't mean Reborn didn't want to see what would happen when, as two full-grown Mafioso, Yamamoto and Masami were sent out on a mission together.

Not to say that Yamamoto didn't have a spectacularly ruthless mind when the situation called for it, or that Masami didn't have the skills necessary to beat Tsuna, Gokudera, and Yamamoto into the ground simultaneously at the moment, but that wasn't where their true genius shined.

So. What had put Masami in conflict with the Yakuza of this area? Hibari was the official "protector" of Namimori, and while Masami didn't make statements she couldn't back up, she tended to play a more shadowy role.

"What are you doing, Dino-san!?" His idiot student — the current one — chose this time to wail in outrage, straining against the whip furiously as Dino knelt down to free him.

"Sorry, sorry, I just had to test your family," Dino reassured, recoiling his whip. "Don't worry, Momokyokai is just some imaginary yakuza group Reborn made up. They'll probably give up and are on their way home now."

Tsuna flailed as he jumped to their feet, looking sideways at Masami, who was now leaning against the wall and fanning herself with her tessen. "No, they aren't, Dino-san! The Momokyokai are definitely a very real, very dangerous yakuza group!"

Oh? Reborn had thoroughly scouted out the yakuza group beforehand, as was only proper, and had found them a rather small, weak group, befitting a test for Tsuna's potential Guardians. But why did his student, oblivious to the darker areas of life and too timid to wander beyond the safety of his home and school, know these things? And with such details as well? Masami made perfect sense, but Tsuna...

"Eeeh!? Reborn, is this true!?" Dino whirled on Reborn, which was a bit disappointing. Obviously, he hadn't given his former student enough surprises during their time together.

"Yup."

"Hieee!" Tsuna shook his head repeatedly and then turned to Masami, already close to panicking. "Masami-san — !"

Masami only arched an eyebrow before turning on her heel. Tension hummed beneath her frame, her usually graceful movements a bit stilted. Curious. "Come along, Sawada-san."

"Right!" Tsuna scrambled after her, which, while not the best of scenarios for a Mafia Boss, was acceptable for the time being because Masami was still stronger than his idiot student. In most ways.

"Huh." Dino stared after the two of them, brow furrowed. "Didn't expect that to happen."

"What do you think of her?" Reborn asked, curious. Even if he was Baka-Dino, there was a reason Dino was such a successful Boss, and it wasn't because he was a bad judge of people.

"Masami?" Dino began to walk after the kids, hands in his pockets. "Ehh...I don't think she likes me much."

"Understandable," Reborn chirped, jumping up to work on the wall beside him. "You're disturbing the peace of Namimori."

"Yeah, I guess." Dino laughed sheepishly. "She seems to boss Tsuna around though. Isn't it supposed to be the other way around?"

"Masami's been mentoring Dame-Tsuna for longer than I have," Reborn told him. "It's probably habit for both of them by now." The girl may have graciously backed off for Reborn, but some things just became natural after a while.

"Is she strong?"

"Definitely." Reborn hadn't actually seen her fight yet, not all-out, but he had seen Hibari fight, and with the strong respect between the siblings, it was natural to assume that Masami could hold her own against her brother.

And that wasn't even getting into the long shadow that the Hibari Clan cast on the underworld.

Dino nodded, voice turning serious. "Is she Guardian material?"

"That remains to be seen." Reborn had his suspicions. "She doesn't entirely match any of the conventional standards for Flame."

"Sounds interesting, but that's not really the largest problem, is it? Will she follow Tsuna? Sometimes that kind of mentor-student bond doesn't break nicely."

Reborn tilted his fedora down. "That's up to Tsuna."

Tsuna and Masami arrived at the yakuza base right as the stronger, heavily-tattooed members showed up. The beaten up thugs littering the floor were clear evidence of Gokudera and Yamamoto's rough and tumble methods of interrogation, and their superiors didn't look too happy about that.

In contrast, Gokudera and Yamamoto, standing side by side and glaring at the newcomers, looked all but delighted when they spotted Tsuna.

"Juudaime, you're safe!" Gokudera exclaimed with a smile, casually holding dynamite between his fingers.

"You look all right," Yamamoto observed, clearly relieved, taking a step back to peer more closely at Tsuna.

"I'm glad you guys are safe, too," Tsuna said, beaming with a mixture of rueful pride and embarrassment. His friends really were crazy strong.

"Hey, look, more of them showed up," one of the yakuza commented.

Another snorted. "It doesn't matter. You lot are going to pay for what you did."

Masami chose that moment to step out from behind Tsuna, smiling like an angel. "Greetings." She bowed shallowly.

The yakuza collectively — excuse his language, he was probably spending way too much time with Gokudera — shit themselves. At least their memory looked to be perfectly intact...?

"Oi..." Gokudera said slowly, glancing from the yakuza to Masami and then back, "what the hell did you do to them, maiko witch?"

Masami fluttered her fan. "Oh, we had a ball, nothing more."

"Hahaha, sounds like fun," Yamamoto said, grinning. "Hey, did you guys have fun?"

"Yes," Masami muttered, glancing at the yakuza with gleaming eyes, "did you have fun?"

If it was possible for the yakuza to go any paler, then it happened. Their knees were shaking, their weapons were on the floor, and they were sweating like mad despite the cool breeze. Tsuna almost felt sorry for them. "H-H-H-HAI!"

Needless to say, there wasn't anymore fighting that day. Tsuna, Yamamoto, and Gokudera were all but escorted out of the yakuza base, followed out with a bunch of breathless apologies and offers of food, water, snacks, whatever they wanted. None of them were oblivious to the fact that all of the still-conscious yakuza were directing said words at Masami, who glided around like a messenger from the heavens, graciously assuaging their concerns.

"Hey, you guys are alright!" Dino called when they met up on their way back home, waving a hand in the air. "Did everything go okay?"

Masami smiled at him, the same sweet, pure smile she had given the yakuza. "Everything went fine."

Tsuna couldn't help but shudder.

"Onii-san? Are you alright?" Masami peered dubiously at her brother, who was languishing in bed, covers pulled up and face half-buried in his pillow. His hair was a bird nest, his eyes were glazed, and he was shivering slightly, a flush on his cheeks.

It was eleven o'clock at night, and the only real reason she was awake was because she had been finishing the last page of her homework. A groan had led to her peeking her head inside his bedroom, which resulted in this particular standoff.

"'m fine," he muttered, voice husky, and then promptly disproved his statement by erupting into a furious coughing fit, body curling up even further beneath the blankets.

Masami sighed and didn't respond, rubbing at her cold bare arms. Instead, she walked downstairs and to the medicine cabinet, frowning at the abnormal weakness of her legs. From there, she took a thermometer, a bag of cough drops, a bottle of paracetamol, and made sure to drop by the kitchen for a glass of warm water.

This was all routine by now. Kyoya might be the strongest fighter in Namimori, with the exception of Reborn and Shamal, but he had always had a weak immune system. Truthfully, Masami was only slightly better.

"Onii-san," she said when she was back by his sickbed. He glared at her weakly but took the thermometer from her. While they waited for the instrument to work, she had him wash down two pills with water and suck on a cough drop.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

"...38.5 degrees," Masami read. She frowned. "I believe it would be best if you went to the hospital this time."

Kyoya didn't respond with anything more than a petulant grumble but that was expected. About the only time he didn't complain or threaten was when he was actually feeling miserable. Then, he seamlessly regressed to a five year old mentality until he felt like his normal self again.

Well, she thought fuzzily to herself, better the hospital staff than me.

"Sawada-san's in the hospital?"

"Yup. Dame-Tsuna and Baka-Dino messed up."

"I see. Well then, I was simply calling to inform you that Onii-san is also in the hospital."

"If we're lucky, maybe they'll meet."

"Indeed."

"Oh, would you mind telling Gokudera about this? I don't have his number."

"I don't either."

"In that case" — and she could hear the smirk in his babyish voice — "it's a good thing you know where he lives, right?"

"This is becoming almost as familiar as Sawada-san's residence," Masami mumbled to herself as she waited outside Room 37's door once again. It didn't escape her notice that neither had been very familiar at all before Reborn had come around.

She supposed she was a very good, dependable, and willing leash for his unruly pseudo-students.

There was an audible fumble of locks before the door was thrown wide open. "What is it this time, maiko witch?" Hayato echoed her thoughts perfectly, leaning against the door frame with a scowl. "Did something happen? Is it Juudaime?"

Briefly, she mourned the previous silence. His loud voice hurt her head. "...Sawada-san's in the hospital."

He choked on air immediately. "Juudaime's in the hospital!?"

"Isn't that what I just said?" She managed a strained smile.

"No, no, what happened!? Who hurt Juudaime!? I'm going to blow them up! Is Juudaime all right!? Is he critical!? Is he going to live!?" Hayato shrieked, getting more and more high-pitched and frantic with each question. His fingers curled, like he wanted to reach for his dynamite or position them into claws.

She hissed out a breath, resisting the urge to rub at her temples. Her extremities felt ridiculously cold, despite the extra layers of clothing she had thrown on. "His leg was injured but otherwise, Sawada-san is quite alright," Masami said, forcing her voice to come out evenly. "Please calm down."

"Don't tell me what to do, maiko witch!" He dashed back inside his apartment and then back out with keys and a wallet. "I need to go visit Juudaime to make sure he's okay! Wait, fuck, I need a gift — a hospital gift — and it has to be amazing for Juudaime — "

"Roses are very nice," she injected mildly.

"Shut up!" He threw over his shoulder as he raced down the stairs. "What sort of roses should I get!? Red, no, black, orange, white, white! White symbolizes purity and innocence, which is perfect for Juudaime! I — why the fuck are you following me, maiko witch!?"

Masami blinked back at him, drooping slightly. "I would like to visit Sawada-san as well." And check on Onii-san. Maybe obtain some antibiotics.

"Fine, but don't get in my fucking way!" Hayato shouted, rushing out the main door. "Now, where's that convenience store — "

"To the right."

"I knew that!" He ran off at top speed while she sighed. By the time Masami reached the convenience store they were talking about, Hayato was already at the counter with a stunning bouquet of white roses, glaring viciously at the poor cashier.

She blew out a breath and leaned against the wall of the store, hiding her face behind her fan and trying to catch her breath.

"You're still here?" Hayato muttered when he came out and saw her again. "Whatever. Which way's the hospital?" He seemed to have calmed down a little at least.

Masami pointed.

"I'M COMING, JUUDAIME!" And...off he went, leaving a trail of dust behind him.

Wincing, she took it back. He hadn't calmed down at all.

Trailing slowly after him, it took Masami around three point to realize that Hayato wasn't using the sidewalks or the crosswalks. In fact, if he continued along his trajectory, he would be running straight through the intersections without a thought to the passing cars.

Her brain shorted out momentarily.

Hayato yelped as he was unceremoniously yanked onto the sidewalk by his arm and whirled around right as a car flashed by where he had been standing seconds before. "Oi, what the fuck — !" He cut himself off, face going blank.

"Gokudera-san," she said slowly, quietly, struggling through the nausea, "we have had this conversation before."

It was trying for her, it didn't make sense, and she would really appreciate it if he made up his mind between being smart and being stupid sometime soon, preferably after the world stopped spinning unreasonably around her.

Masami mentally counted to ten, trying to focus through the buzzing in her ears. Her fingers, ice-cold, curled into fists, and her cheeks were burning. She was hanging onto composure through pure stubbornness, and she knew it.

He hissed out a sharp breath, lips pressing together. Green eyes flashed. "Juudaime's waiting for me, and this has nothing to do with you," he snapped. "I didn't ask for you to do whatever the hell is it that you're doing, alright!? Just leave me al — Hey!"

The wave of dizziness hadn't been anticipated. Her traitorous legs buckled, and he caught her purely on instinct. She was, Masami recognized blatantly, shivering. Strange. Now that she wasn't standing anymore, it seemed hard to get back up again.

Unfortunate.

"What the fuck!?" A cool hand pressed against her forehead, and he cursed again, shifting his hold so it was a bit more comfortable. "You're burning up; why the hell are you out and about? And you say I'm being stupid. Where's that crazy brother of yours?"

It took her a good minute to process the question. It took her another to seize upon the ill-hidden concern in his voice and wonder. Maybe, just maybe... "In the hospital," she muttered, blinking her way back into coherency. "He had a fever last night."

He scoffed. "Yeah, and obviously, you caught whatever bug he had, too. Come on, get up. I'm not carrying your ass all the way to the hospital."

She hated being sick. Disliked hospitals. Abhorred the claustrophobic feeling when she was trapped by white walls and chemical silence. "Thank you, but that's not going to be necessary."

Masami forced herself to find her footing again, a cold sweat breaking out along her nape. He had to steady her again when she wavered, vision flickering in and out at the corners.

Hayato's look was exasperated. Incredulous. "What, you're just going to walk all the way back to your isolated mansion at the edges of Namimori? That's pushing it even for you, maiko witch."

"Isn't Sawada-san waiting for you?" she asked dryly, pulling away.

"Don't change the subject," he groused but was evidently torn anyway.

Masami's response was to hail a taxi. While scarce in Namimori, few taxi drivers would deny her if she requested service. "Your flowers are going to be wasted, Gokudera-san."

He glared. "I know what you're doing." Shifting his weight uneasily, Hayato waited until the taxi pulled up before stomping away, grumbling about stupid witches underneath his breath.

"Please stay out of traffic," she called after him, words slurring slightly, and got back a snarled "yeah, yeah." As the taxi sped away, she noted how he carefully stayed on the sidewalks even as he bulldozed his way to the hospital.

It was agreement. However thoughtless it was, it was agreement. At the moment, all she needed was to gain a foothold.

That was what her mother had taught her. And that was exactly what she had done.

Masami smiled through the haze of heaviness and closed her eyes, leaning her head back against the cold headrest. Perfect. This little bout of illness had gotten her somewhere after all.

If guilt and responsibility were what she needed to get Hayato to listen to common sense and keep himself from taking stupid risks, then she'd abuse that for all that it was worth.

New Years was spent quietly among the Hibari Siblings. Tradition or not, it wasn't like them to make a big fuss, so they didn't. That didn't mean it wasn't a nice reprieve, anyway. No herbivores, no idiot shenanigans, no paperwork, no prefects to train and direct — she was very grateful.

"Happy New Years, Onii-san," Masami greeted her brother in the morning, smiling gently. She wore an elaborate red kimono with splashes of white baby's breath, her matching hair ornaments brushing lightly against her collarbone.

"Hn. Happy New Years," Kyoya responded, dressed in a black kimono with a blue sash. He didn't smile, exactly, but the corners of his lips tilted up minutely, and that was enough for her.

After they were done with their preparations, Masami sat on one side of the kotatsu, and Kyoya sat on the other. They hadn't bothered with the usual decorations, but they had a hot pot and osechi on the table.

On special holidays and their birthdays were about the only times their parents ever called voluntarily, disregarding Masami's recent inquiries. Not that either of the two really needed evidence that their parents still remembered them by this point, but it was nice regardless.

Rika called first and said her well-wishes to Kyoya, which was returned briskly. After confirming that Kyoya was just as verbose as ever, Rika asked to speak to Masami.

"Greetings, Okaa-san," Masami said into the phone, moving out into the living room to give Kyoya some space. "Happy New Years."

"Happy New Years. Masami, are you and your brother still involved with the new Vongola Heir?"

"Hai."

"Hmm. Very well then. I will be returning to Namimori this summer."

Masami paused, honestly startled. Her mother hadn't been home since...two years ago? Three? Three. "If I may ask, why?"

"The Vongola aren't the most powerful Family in Italy for nothing, Masami. If you're to get involved with them, you will need more advanced training. Your father has been educating you on Flames, I hope?"

"He has."

"Good. Inform your brother. I'll see you again in a few months' time. Don't let your fangs dull."

"Goodbye, Okaa-san."

Click.

Masami stared at the beeping phone for a moment before humming thoughtfully and returning it to its proper place. Interesting. She would have to shift her plans around a bit.

Joining Kyoya at the kotatsu again, she picked up her chopsticks. "Okaa-san will be coming to Namimori this summer," she informed him.

He narrowed his eyes at her. While not completely unwelcome, one of their parents returning would mean a minor loss of independence, which would be frustrating for both of them but likely more so for him. She was more concerned with her freedom. "Why?"

"She wishes to train us."

Kyoya frowned, disgruntled. "It's not necessary."

"Vongola," she reminded. "Mafia."

"Herbivores. I'll just bite them all to death." He tore savagely at his piece of beef.

Masami considered the best way to respond to that. "Reborn-san is Mafia."

His scowl deepened. "He's an Arcobaleno." Just like their grand-uncle.

"Perhaps," she said, "but it's better to be cautious than to be prey, Onii-san."

Later that day, Masami lounged on a zabuton and frowned. "Can a Sky harmonize with an unwilling Element?"

"It's possible. Highly ill-advised but possible, especially with a very strong Sky and a very weak Element."

"What would happen?"

"Most likely? In the best case scenario, the Element in question would eventually grow content under the Sky and stop fighting the Harmonization. In the worst case scenario, the Element would tear itself into pieces, reject their Flames, and quite possibly destabilize the Sky itself."

"And some people do it anyway?"

"Skies are accepting people, but never forget, while that's ninety percent truth for all of the Skies I have met, it is also ten percent stereotype. Many Skies are also the Bosses of crime syndicates. They know how to blackmail, threaten, and murder. Don't be tricked into thinking that just because someone is a Sky, they are harmless or kind."

"Stereotypes," she muttered, closing her eyes and leaning back. "If that's the case, then why buy into the connection between Flames and personality?"

"There's certainly some truth to it. No one has yet understood the connection between the two, but you'll find that there are similarities between people of the same Flame more often than not."

"...which Flame do you believe Onii-san has?"

"You're the one who has been living alone with him since kindergarten."

"It's possible he's a Cloud."

"Have you talked to him about this yet?"

"No. However, I have educated him on the different characteristics each Flames has."

"Think on it some more and ask your mother when she returns if you require more clarification."

"Hai, Otou-san. Happy New Years."

"Happy New Years. Goodbye, Masami."

"Goodbye."

A few days after that, Masami noticed another pre-teen following Tsunayoshi, this one bearing a long scarf and a ridiculous book. Fuuta de la Stella, the Ranking Prince, she was told after she asked Reborn. Having no inclination to get ranked, Masami avoided the boy.

She didn't bother to go to school on Valentine's Day either, knowing it would only aggravate her further. That didn't stop the poor prefect who was chosen to complete the momentous task of opening her locker from being buried in chocolates, of course, but it was the thought that counted, right?

Right.

Honestly, after the sixth confession under the shadow of the largest tree on school grounds, Masami had come to the sad realization that while Kyoya's fan club and the rest of the school were too frightened to approach Kyoya, the same didn't apply to her. Oh, plenty of people were still wary of her, especially now that she was a prefect, but it was never enough in the face of youthful love. And she very much did not need that at the moment.

Sometimes, Masami wanted to go back to the nice old elementary school days. She usually ended up taking back those thoughts after a single patrol past Namimori Elementary though.

One cold morning, Masami woke up to find the world outside her window coated in snow. The town was silent, as it should be on the true winter days, and small flurries continued to fall from the sky in a whisper of white. Icicles hung from the trees, and the white powder covering the ground was immaculate, undisturbed.

She breathed out a small sigh of appreciation.

Unlike Kyoya, who trained for an hour in the morning every day without fail, Masami wasn't a morning person. She would get up without complaint, and with tea, she was fine for the day, but if given the choice, she would rather sleep for a full eight hours.

Any less and without caffeine in her system and Masami was a terror. A well-mannered, sweet-looking terror but a terror nonetheless. Tsunayoshi and the prefects could attest to that.

But today seemed to be an exception.

Masami slipped out of bed and dressed in a pure white kimono. The tatami mats were cool beneath her bare feet, but she paid that no mind. Cloth trailing behind her, she made her way to the kitchen where she prepared a pot of hot green tea. Tugging on some white socks, she made her way outside.

An hour later, Kyoya found her sitting out on the engawa, ankles crossed and hands cupping a steaming cup of tea. Splayed out before them, the garden was a vision of soft, crisp winter beauty. Their breaths were visible in the frigid air, and beyond the dancing snowflakes, all was still.

Kyoya didn't say a word but walked away on silent feet after stopping to take in the scene for a few seconds. The heavy weight of a kakefuton on her shoulders not long after that wasn't as much of a surprise as it should have been.

Masami smiled, soft and gentle as the snow itself. "Thank you."

"Breakfast?"

"Still warm in the oven."

"You're not coming with me on patrols today." It was more of a statement than a question.

She listened to the sound (or lack thereof) of peace and contentment, so rare nowadays, and agreed. "No, I'm not."

Later, Kyoya would come home with a smirk on his face and inform her that he'd had a great deal of fun aiming snowballs at unsuspecting people and watching them stammer when they whirled around, ready to scream bloody murder, only to recognize the Skylark.

Later, Masami would laugh and shake her head at her brother's antics. Few people knew it, but Kyoya actively enjoyed his reputation of doom. She would ask if anything interested had happened, and he would tell her a story of a humongous turtle and silly herbivores and a flailing omnivore chasing after a strange turbo-chameleon.

But that was later. And for now, Masami was happy to watch the snow fall.

(She wondered what other sights the world had to offer. She wondered if she would ever see them. She wondered if she could ever reach out and grab the opportunities dancing before her.)

Masami was going through her katas when the door to the dojo was nudged open.

"Greetings," she said idly without stopping or looking up. "What can I do for you, Reborn-san?"

"Ciaossu, Masami. Would you like to go on a trip to the zoo with Hibari?"

She straightened up and snapped her fans shut, eyeing Reborn thoughtfully. Her brother liked animals, but... "Onii-san won't go unless everyone else has been chased out," she said. By force or not.

"That's okay," Reborn said, unperturbed, and two tickets suddenly became one. "Why don't you go anyway?"

She arched an eyebrow delicately. "Sawada-san wouldn't happen to be visiting today, would he?"

He stared at her without blinking and smiled. "Dame-Tsuna could use a suitable pet, don't you think?"

Masami smiled back and took the ticket.

(She didn't want to go. She didn't want to partake in whatever chaos was certain to happen. She had five stacks of paperwork on her desk, she had prefects to train, she didn't want to have to clean up whatever mess would be happening this time —

She had a duty to her brother and his town.)

Masami inhaled deeply and got to work.

She finished the paperwork in record time. She passed out training schedules to the prefects, she informed Tetsuya what needed to be done, and she went to the zoo after promising Kyoya that she would take pictures of all the small animals and send them to him later.

Not in so many words, of course, but that was the deal nevertheless.

Twenty minutes in, while she was observing the gray wolves, she caught sight of Tsunayoshi. Kyoko happened to be with him, which explained a great deal. Reborn did appear to relish in messing around with his student's love life...or whatever remained of it.

"Let me fight a kangaroo!" roared an exuberant voice nearby.

Masami took one look at Ryohei and turned on her heel. She glided away and didn't look back. He had destroyed a wall of her home just three days ago. There was no need to indulge the herbivore and actually engage with him today.

The hedgehogs were cute. Nearby, a bull was preoccupied with a boy dressed in a cow suit. Retrieving her camera from her bag, Masami took a dozen photos of the hedgehogs from multiple angles and wandered off.

Halfway inside the bird house, a hand suddenly clasped down on her shoulder.

Only Takeshi's reflexes kept that hand from being severed at the wrist. "Woah!" he gasped, jumping back. "Hey, it's okay, it's only me, Masami!"

Masami blinked slowly and snapped her fan closed again. "Yamamoto-san." Since when did she lose control of her instincts like that? Randomly attacking people just because they startled her was more Kyoya's quirk than hers.

Mistakes like this weren't acceptable.

"My sincere apologies." Turning around fully, she bowed, brow slightly wrinkled. She didn't even know what was wrong with her, which meant that she didn't know herself like she should, which — her fingers tightened on her gunsen. "My reaction was unwarranted."

Takeshi being Takeshi, he only laughed and waved her off. "It's fine, it's fine. It's my fault for surprising you. I won't do it again. The birds here are pretty cool, huh?"

"Yes," Masami concurred, letting the subject shift because it would be useless to start psychoanalyzing herself in the middle of the very crowded zoo. "Would you like to take a picture?"

"Sure!" He snapped a few photos of a falcon and an owl with a grin before handing the camera back to her. "Did the little guy ask you to come for Tsuna, too?"

"He did." She began to drift out of the exhibit, Takeshi keeping pace with her. "I believe Sawada-san is having a fine time with Sasagawa-san at the moment."

"Oh, Senpai? I thought I saw him at the bear exhibit."

"...no, the other Sasagawa-san."

"That's kinda confusing, you know. Is there a reason you're so formal all the time?"

Masami shrugged, catching sight of a sign that proclaimed that lions were to the right and tigers were to the left. There were, she noticed, far more people gathered around the lions.

"It was what I was taught," she said vaguely, taking the left path. The decorum was really more out of obligation than any sense of genuine respect anyway, at least for most individuals.

"Huh. Is that where Hibari got his herbivore thing from, too?" He folded her arms behind his head.

"You could look at it that way," she replied. "Do you prefer lions or tigers?" Maybe she should have asked him the question before choosing for them? But crowding, more crowding — enough said.

"Ahhh...I like both," Takeshi said, smiling easily. "I hear tigers tend to be more temperamental though."

She laughed. "It isn't illogical. Lions are pride animals. Tigers are solitary."

"And you like tigers better?" There was no judgment in his voice, only calm curiosity.

"I think they're more interesting," Masami corrected, leaning against the fence and peering past the wire grid. Five white tigers lazed around while the sixth, the largest male, prowled around its cage. It spotted them soon enough, and its lips pulled back in the slightest of snarls.

"Don't think it likes us very much," Takeshi noted.

"No." She didn't bother trying to take a picture of the majestic animal. It would be a degradation. "Where would you like to go now?"

He didn't ask why they were leaving so soon after their arrival. "The clouded leopards are over there. Wanna go take a look?"

As they left, Masami glanced back over her shoulder precisely once. The tiger glared back at her, coiled power and simmering rage. She almost wanted to reach out and touch that ferocious wildness.

"Hey! Aren't you going to apologize for bumping into me!?" A loud, belligerent voice reached their ears two minutes of comfortable conversation later. "Hey, kid! Don't ignore me! Say something!"

"Think there's trouble?" Takeshi asked.

She scanned the area and detected silver hair within seconds. "I think there's Gokudera-san," she murmured. He really did like picking fights, didn't he? She was almost more resigned than upset. "He shouldn't cause a commotion in such a public area."

"With his fireworks, right? They're pretty good." Takeshi grinned and cupped his hands around his mouth. "Hey, Gokudera!"

Hayato twitched, a mere second away from lighting the dynamite stick he held in his hand with the cigarette in his mouth. "Tch. It's the baseball idiot and the maiko witch. Why couldn't it be Juudaime?"

Laughing, Takeshi ambled forward and flung an arm around Hayato. "Relax, Gokudera. Tsuna's here, too. I'm sure he's having fun."

"Don't fucking touch me, baseball idiot!" Hayato snapped. "I'll blow you up!"

"Oi, chill with the fireworks. Masami said we shouldn't cause trouble here."

"Pardon me," Masami said very calmly to the thugs that had been yelling at Hayato.

"I don't have to listen to you! And I definitely don't have to listen to her!"

"Gokudera-san happens to be — "

"Okay, okay, calm down a little, alright?"

" — an acquaintance of mine, so I would appreciate it if — "

"Hell no! Get the fuck off of me, you idiot!"

" — you would cease antagonizing him." She smiled. Angelically.

"O-O-O-Of course!" the thug stammered out, eyes so wide she could see his veins. He backed away steadily, pulling his lackeys with him. "S-Sorry for the trouble!" Aaand off he went, leaving behind a trail of dust.

There was a brief period of silence before Masami turned around to see Hayato and Takeshi frozen in the act of trying to restrain each other, both staring at her.

She opened her fan to hide the bottom half of her face, knowing full well that her smile was more lethal than polite by this point. "Is something wrong, Gokudera-san, Yamamoto-san?"

"Yeah. Witch, what the fuck?" Hayato took a step back from Takeshi, throwing in a glare that said stay away, before continuing to squint at Masami. "First it was those damn Momokyokai, and now this!? Why is every shady dude around scared stiff of you?"

"I kinda want to know, too," Takeshi added, rubbing the back of his head in a chagrined manner. Despite that, his eyes were dark and sharp.

Masami gestured with a twist of her wrist for them to follow her as she strolled down the rest of the path. She wanted to move. "Onii-san can be a scary individual," she said mildly.

"Yeah, but those guys weren't scared of him, they were scared of you," Hayato argued, increasing the length of his strides to catch up to her, gesturing wildly with his hands.

Takeshi ambled along on her other side, head tilted a bit to the side. "Those Momokyokai guys seemed to know you personally," he commented. "Did you have an argument with them or something?"

"I told you, we had a ball." Masami raised her camera and captured three shots of the dozing leopards. "Where do these cats normally live?"

"They're pretty widespread," Hayato said, matter-of-fact. "The neofelis nebulosa species range from countries of the Himalayas to Malaysia. They thrive in heavily forested areas, which is why they're pretty rare nowadays."

"Wow!" Takeshi grinned, clearly impressed. "You really know a lot about these guys, huh!?"

"Yeah, well, it's nothing special," Hayato muttered, crossing his arms. There was a hint of red on his cheeks though, and he glanced to the side rather than look at Takeshi when he said, "You would know this, too, if you ever bothered using your brain."

"I would be impressed, too," Masami drawled, leaning against the small bronze plate nearby, "but that information is all right here."

"Oh, shut up, maiko witch!" Hayato spat out, glaring death daggers at her with a blush while Takeshi burst out laughing.

"Zoo district report," the broadcast system suddenly blasted, "Some lions have escaped due to unexpected attacks destroying the cages. The current situation is very dangerous. All visitors, please proceed towards the exit for your own safety."

Approximately two seconds later, a very, very familiar shriek rose into the air. "HIIIEEEE!"

"Juudaime!" Hayato shouted, already sprinting towards the sound.

"Tsuna!" Takeshi called at the exact same time, running off as well.

Masami stared after them for a moment, conflicted. Should she...? Her fingernails dug into her palms. But — But no, she was sure Hayato and Takeshi and Tsuna were more than enough to take care of a few lions, especially with Reborn in the mix.

Shaking her head, she meandered away to take pictures of monkeys instead of getting involved in that problem.

It probably said something about the direction her life had been going in recently when she wasn't even surprised when Fon joined her five minutes later, Lichi chattering away to its distant relatives.

If he noticed that she was a tad quieter than usual, he didn't say a word.

Tsuna was pretty much resigned to having to fight Hibari for anything and everything he wanted. It was practically expected by now, even if the favor in question at the moment were the sakura trees Hibari had apparently claimed for himself.

Sometimes, he wondered why Hibari was so unreasonable when Masami was so reasonable. Then, he remembered the "help" he'd received from the younger sister — somehow, somehow, Reborn's was worse — and he hastily revised his thoughts.

The Hibari Siblings were both impossible in their own different ways. And Tsuna was the lucky guy who had to deal with both of them.

Yay...(not)...

Again. Why was this his life!?

"Whoever has their knee touch the ground loses," Hibari ordained, sounding more bored and disdainful than interested.

"Let's do it, Juudaime!" Gokudera insisted. "Actually, let me do it!"

"Those are the rules. I want to see the sakura trees, too." Yamamoto shrugged, smiling.

Tsuna groaned and gave Reborn the stink-eye before turning back to the prefect. "Hibari-san, we just fought yesterday," he pointed out, thoroughly exasperated. He still had the colorful bruises from that, too.

Hibari only smirked. "Take it or leave it, small animal."

"Reborn! We're going to get wrecked!" Tsuna wailed despite knowing all his protests would be disregarded.

"Don't worry, that's why I called over a doctor," Reborn said calmly, sitting on a lower tree branch.

"That guy only helps women!"

"Heey...aren't you feisty," Shamal grouched, sidling up to Hibari like the creepy pervert he sorta was. "Don't you have a sister? She was, hmm, feisty, too."

The clearing went dead silent.

Tsuna barely noticed the absolutely livid look on Hibari's face over the blood roaring in his ears.

It wasn't —

He had eyes and ears. He knew that Masami was a very pretty girl. He was aware that some boys in his class had a crush on her. He had overheard some of his classmates debating over whether Masami was prettier than Kyoko, or vice versa.

Tsuna knew all that.

It was just, to him, this was Masami. Masami, who was his first friend and his kinda mentor. Masami, who was secretive on a good day and utterly unreadable on a bad day. Masami, who was subtly kind and gently mean and beautifully strong, and —

Tsuna had never thought of Masami like that.

And, of course, Masami could protect herself. Tsuna could barely stand a chance against her in their spars even now, and ever since that frigid winter day when Masami had torn apart an entire yakuza base by herself, Tsuna had understood that she was harder, colder, than he was, probably more so than he could ever be.

Tsuna didn't need to protect Masami from anything. Masami had always protected him, from bullies and yakuza and his own dame-ness.

It had been more than three years since he had first sat down on that rooftop and dared to eat lunch with the most terrifying girl in school. Since then, Tsuna had learned that Masami liked music and history, was traditional, pleasant, and oh-so-graceful, disliked lemons and uncertainty, and maybe that was pretty much it.

Masami wasn't Hibari, who was more untouchable than the clouds, but she was elusive and faraway and wild, too. Just in such a style that you never noticed until you tried to describe her and came up short.

In the short time that they had been with him, Tsuna could freely say that he knew Gokudera and Yamamoto much better than he knew Masami. He could even acknowledge that they were so much more open, so much more... his than she was, had ever been, but — but —

"Dr. Shamal." Tsuna took a step forward, distantly aware that everyone was staring at him, including Hibari, who hadn't had the chance to eviscerate Shamal yet, but not really comprehending it in the strange heat that enveloped him.

"Please," he said, quiet but absolute, "don't ever talk about Masami-san like that again."

If he had been focusing on his tutor, he would have seen Reborn's lips tilt up in a small, satisfied smile as he surveyed the golden orange color of his students' eyes. But he wasn't, so Tsuna only saw how Shamal turned to look at him, something keen and assessing surfacing beneath his drunken exterior.

Assassin, his mind reminded him. Trident Shamal, he's not just some womanizing pervert.

"Maa, so young and already lecturing," Shamal sighed, the pout his lips twisted into disturbing on a soul-deep level. "You aren't a man yet, so you wouldn't understand. One day, the unquenchable flame of desire will begin burning in you as well!"

"Jeez, just shut up already, won't you, you pervert-doctor!?" Gokudera barked, teeth bared and dynamite in his hands. "Don't bother Juudaime with your stupid fantasies! Besides! The maiko witch is underage, you damn pedophile!"

"Pssh. You need to lighten up, Hayato." Shamal paused and took in Tsuna's mulish expression before sighing again and raising his hands. "Alright, alriiight. I'll leave the girl alone, happy?"

"Yes." Tsuna took a deep breath, feeling like he was waking up from a dream now that he had the man's agreement, slowly ascending from the heart of that fire to face the fuzzy, terrifying world. "Eh...?"

"Well, I'm not," Hibari said and slammed his tonfa into Shamal's face. Hard. Hard.

"NOEHNFUGYAH!" Shamal shrieked as he was tossed backward, through several trees, and crashed into the trunk of a particularly strong tree, sliding down with a broken groan.

Tsuna winced. He could tell from experience that Hibari hadn't been holding back at all. Shamal would be lucky if he didn't end up with a concussion.

"Idiot," Gokudera muttered. "He deserved it even more than usual this time."

Hibari focused acutely on Tsuna and smirked in a decidedly more alarming way than usual. "You're sharpening your fangs, omnivore," he announced. "I expect a decent fight today."

Tsuna whimpered, all previously found bravo disappearing in an instant.

"Onii-san?"

Kyoya grunted as he walked the final steps to the bench and forced himself not to collapse on it. He still had his pride, cheap tricks or not. He sat down with only a fraction of his usual grace but with every movement under control.

That done, he turned to look at his concerned sister.

The sakura kanzashi in Masami's hair dangled. A simple white sash tied her equally white yukata together around her waist, contrasting the embroidered pink flowers and green vines. Her ankles were crossed, her fan was open, and her eyes were calculating.

There was a barely noticeable tension tainting her normally serene aura, but he didn't say a word. Yet.

Any other herbivore in their territory would have probably said something idiotic along the lines of 'are you okay?' or 'do you need help?'. Masami only looked him over slowly, nodded at whatever she saw, and said, "What happened?"

Kyoya leaned back and, in the precise, blunt language their mother had hammered into them when giving a report, outlined the past ten minutes. His eyes were closed, but he had no doubt that even if they had been open, his sister's face would have told him nothing.

That, too, was something Rika had taught, although Masami had been slipping a bit recently.

When he was done, Kyoya was more than happy to simply doze in the silence that fell, knowing Masami was doing some more convoluted thinking with the pieces he had given her. He didn't even try to keep up with her thought patterns; it would only give him a headache.

"My," she said at last, "Sawada-san is growing into his own, isn't he?"

He hummed noncommittally. "He's not a carnivore. Not truly."

"No. Not yet." And Masami smiled like she was going to slit someone's throat and dance over their grave.

Chapter Text

Salsa: a passionate Puerto Rican ballroom dance with six steps over eight counts of music.

It was like an itch building beneath her skin, untouchable and intolerable.

By no means was Masami a stranger to the feeling. She'd been aware of it on some level since she was a child, waning and waxing with the call of the winds and the freedom in the roads. Even as a young child, she'd known she couldn't assuage the itch, at first because she was weak and then because of her ever stable brother.

It hadn't been comfortable, had never been comfortable, staying in such a small, (mostly) peaceful town like Namimori, but Rika hadn't taught her daughter self-control for nothing. Masami had gritted her teeth and stomped down on her longing and went about her affairs.

This recent bout of restlessness was worse than the others that had come before it though. It was cutting into her concentration, her patience, and her daily life, and that...was dangerous, both to her and the people around her. Masami was nearly just as lethal as her brother, most people simply never realized it.

She needed that restraint, or people would get hurt, plain and simple.

Masami was nothing if not mindful of herself, and this couldn't be allowed to continue. Meditation wasn't helping. If anything, meditation made things worse. Every time she came out of a meditative trance, she was more restless and fidgety than before.

Something had to give.

It all came to a head one day, but for the life of her, Masami could never quite decide what had finally pushed her over the edge.

Perhaps it was the incident during morning patrols after exactly two hours of sleep, the dynamite and arguments during lunch, and then the three piles of paperwork on her desk that awaited her after school, along with the mess that almost blew up the baseball grounds.

Perhaps it was Reborn announcing yet another 'traditional' Vongola event that would be sure to wreck havoc on her school, town, and peace in three days; perhaps it was just the walls closing around her until it was much too difficult to breathe.

Masami bid goodbye to Tetsuya and sent off a text message to Kyoya as she left the school. Expression blankly polite, she smiled back at the civilians who greeted her and walked to the edge of Namimori and then beyond, into the wild forests that surrounded the town.

Calmly, she found a well-worn trail and placed her bag on a nearby bench. Her every move was perfectly controlled and graceful, and then she turned to the inviting dirt road in front of her and closed her eyes briefly. She flexed her fingers and listened to her heartbeat and felt the troubled heat pounding in her veins.

The mask of reserve shattered into a million pieces, and she ran.

It was exhilarating. It was bone-deep relief. It was wonderful.

Masami ran and ran and ran. The trees blurred past her, and the wind caught at her hair. The ground welcomed her every step, and she laughed freely as she let loose for the first time in months.

This was why she adored dancing, but if dancing was the closest thing she could get to freedom indoors, then running was the closest thing she could get to freedom outdoors, without outright departing.

And so, she let that desire to explore and move and be untameable by anyone and anything flow through her body and propel her forward.

Masami ran four entire rounds on the trail before calming down enough to slide to the ground and lean against a trunk and think.

What was she doing? She knew better.

It took pathetic little effort to identify exactly why and how she had let herself devolve to this state of uncontrollable panic and anxiety. This was why Otou-san had always stressed delegating, which she absolutely had not done.

Since her entry to Namimori Middle, she'd taken up nearly the entirety of her brother's paperwork load, she'd been training his men and taking care of three teenage boys, and that wasn't even counting the antics that Reborn pulled left and right.

And in doing so, though to be honest, none of it was anything she could hand off easily, she'd been spreading herself much too thin, stressing herself to the point where everything became a trigger, and alone time, free time, became a myth.

But, oh, it was galling, because Masami wanted to believe she could handle it. Stopping now was admitting defeat, admitting she couldn't juggle all of them at once, admitting she was inadequate, and she hated, hated, hated that thought, but then —

She wasn't like Kyoya. She had known that for a long, long time. Kyoya had always been her anchor, had always been what was keeping her in Namimori before Tsunayoshi had even entered the equation, but he, he would stay and she would leave, and that had been inevitable from the get-go.

The sun had long since set, leaving the moon to rise and the stars to shine. The temperature was steadily dropping, though it was warm enough that she was fine in her school uniform. Masami rose to her feet and paced. This couldn't go on. She would have a mental breakdown.

If this didn't count as one already.

She thought and thought. She made plans. She discarded plans. She returned home as the sun peeked over the horizon. She took a shower, changed into clean clothes, and made breakfast. When Kyoya came down, neither of them said anything about last night.

Instead, Masami said, "You're not graduating, Onii-san?"

"No." He snorted. "The sheep need their shepherd."

She smiled, more centered than she had been for a while now. "I see. Next year then?"

Kyoya hummed noncommittally. "Maybe."

And that was that.

On the first day of her second year of middle school, Masami observed Naito Longchamp from a window for precisely five minutes before making the executive decision to never, ever deal with that boy personally. It would only aggravate her.

And if Tsunayoshi somehow worked up the nerve to claim she was in his fledgling Family, then she would simply have to teach him the error of his ways.

She had no desire to get involved in that problem. So she didn't. It was oddly freeing, and the small smile that tilted her lips lacked the stress it had boasted for months.

The first term passed in a blur of maddening discipline and self-denial.

In fact, the only positive thing during those weeks Masami had to look forward to was Rika's return during the summer holiday.

It was a unanimous agreement between Masami and Kyoya to spar more than normal before their mother arrived. In addition, she reviewed the basics of her childhood lessons in the spare time she carved out for herself while he tidied up the house. If nothing else, Hibari Rika was a true carnivore who could scare even her children.

The rest of her time was spent on trying to change her own self-destructive patterns.

A week into the new school year, Masami informed Kyoya that she was giving a good amount of their paperwork back to him. He wasn't happy, of course, but observed the dark circles under her eyes, not yet covered by make-up, and agreed reluctantly.

She would still be doing the organization and filing; he would just have to actually look over and sign the papers. Somehow, she ended up awake at ten o'clock at night doing paperwork anyway. It was better than the daily four hours of sleep she'd been getting before, so she shrugged and accepted it.

Eventually, Masami drew up a training program for the prefects and assigned three of the more responsible ones the task of implanting it. She had planned to just stop by every week or so while training was in session to see how it was going, but she found herself there three out of five school days.

Tetsuya was giving her exasperated looks. Masami ignored him kindly.

The boys were the most frustrating.

Tsunayoshi continued to improve steadily, fussing the whole way. Hayato continued to be irrational about his own health, although frequent guilt trips were waylaying his usual self-destructive instincts a bit. Takeshi continued to be oblivious to the truth of the 'mafia game', although his instincts in combat only continued to improve.

They never really noticed her dilemma directly. Masami was naturally reticent and distant, after all, and it was easy to twist that perception to her advantage. No one noticed if she was a bit more aloof than normal, especially now that Tsunayoshi was distracted by all of the shenanigans going on around him.

Evidence of her continued poise or not, she couldn't deny that the coil in her chest only wound tighter and tighter every time Tsunayoshi or Hayato or Takeshi came to her with this catastrophe or another and expected her to fix everything.

She also couldn't deny that she always did. It was vexing; she knew the problem, knew she should stop, and yet — she couldn't quite bring herself to burn her bridges.

Kyoya certainly noticed if the dances he forced her into when the herbivores weren't around were any clue. It wasn't like the siblings to be warm and fuzzy with each other, and he wasn't, but Masami was grateful nevertheless because even if the dancing didn't completely help, it did take off the edge.

If, after one particularly exacting spar, she'd collapsed against the wall and buried her face in her palms, well, it was her brother, so it had been okay, okay for her to crack just a little. He hadn't said a word, only slid down next to her, so close their shoulders brushed, and stayed until she had pulled herself together again.

Still, by the time Reborn had graciously taken Tsunayoshi, Hayato, and Takeshi off of her hands to a trip to Mafia Land and Rika had arrived in Namimori, beneath her cool, placid facade, Masami was straining her control to the breaking point.

Rika made true on her promises. She led them to the dojo as soon as she was back and proceeded to beat them into the ground. And again. Completely effortless, no matter if they attacked separately or together.

There was nothing like being defeated soundly to make you reevaluate your life.

"Well," she sighed after Kyoya and Masami were on their knees in the middle of the room, weapons long since disarmed, panting for breath, for the seventh time. "I see I have my work cut out for me."

Training under their mother was just as strenuous as Masami remembered it to be. Only, this time around, in addition to reintroducing them to the floor, she also taught them stealth, infiltration, pickpocketing, and surveillance. If they ever ended up on the streets or wandered into an underground criminal syndicate by accident, they would do just fine for themselves. Perhaps that was the point.

Personally, Masami just thought that Tsunayoshi and the prefects of the Disciplinary Committee had absolutely no room to complain about her methods.

Masami picked up on most of the skills her mother taught them with an almost disturbing ease, but that wasn't what bothered her the most about Rika's visit.

It was that Rika had taken one look at her and seen straight through her bullshit.

"Onii-san is fine with this arrangement. Why?" Masami asked one late afternoon while they were both out in the garden. Kyoya was off doing patrols. Even their mother couldn't stop him, not that she'd tried.

Rika huffed, sitting primly on the engawa. "You aren't your brother."

"He's a Cloud, too," Masami murmured, staring up at the sky. It looked like a painting. "He handles his responsibilities fine. Why?"

"Masami, both of you may be Clouds, but that means little. Your nature is that of a free-floating feather, while Kyoya is more akin to an unmovable rock. People will inevitably weigh you down, but a dozen men can't crush a boulder with their weight. His sense of freedom is different from yours."

Masami clipped a twig and kept quiet.

Rika sighed. "I know you love your brother but accept that you two are not one and the same. He is his own person and you are yours. Do not put what Kyoya wants above what you need."

"I want to stay," she whispered.

Not in Namimori, but with Onii-san. With Tetsuya and Tsunayoshi. And maybe with Hayato and Takeshi, too.

But at the same time, she wanted nothing more than to leave.

"He'll be here when you come back," Rika said pragmatically.

"If I leave, the others—"

"You are no one's dog; there is no need to go, wagging your tail, when someone calls." Rika's tone was scathing, having dragged the whole story out of her daughter on her first day back. "I taught you better than this, Masami. You are no one's therapist or babysitter, so stop acting like it."

Masami twitched, feeling as if she was four years old again and being reprimanded for greeting her brother improperly. "They need someone looking after them, or they'll self-destruct, Okaa-san."

"Maybe so, but unless you've signed a contract stating that you'll be their babysitter for the rest of their lives, you can't stop them. You may try, but you can't change someone unless they want to change, Masami. It's a waste of effort. Now, I'll ask you now, do you consider these boys enemies?"

Tsunayoshi, an enemy? It was laughable. "No, Okaa-san."

Rika raised her eyebrows. "Are you planning to become one of the Vongola Heir's Guardians?"

"Not particularly, no."

"Are you planning to become one of those boys' wife?"

Maybe when the sky turned red and Tsunayoshi could fly. "No."

"Do any of them serve you directly?"

That sounded like a nightmare. "No."

"Then there's no reason to put any more effort into them than you already have," Rika said. "It's their life. There's no reason for you to ruin yours to fix theirs. Side projects stay just that: off to the side. You've been letting this — them — control your actions, and that's an unsustainable philosophy."

Masami didn't reply, but she didn't need to. The sting of chagrin was an unfamiliar one. She knew there was a reason their parents rarely came back home.

Rika covered a yawn and left to train Kyoya, leaving her to her thoughts. But before she did, she threw over her shoulder, "Besides. Do they really need you? Or are you purposefully clinging to the preconception that you're needed?"

Kyoya knew something had changed in Masami. Had been changing, if he was honest. He'd known that she'd needed something, some kind of push for that last step, but heart-to-heart talks had never been his forte, even if it was his baby sister, so it was just as well that their mother had returned home.

He didn't know what they had talked about, but he could see Masami finding her balance again. She'd been doing better these past few weeks before Rika had come back, compared to the previous year of stress and work, but it had been a stop-gap measure at best, not a pace meant for endurance.

Now...now, she was plotting.

Not that she brooded visibly, but that was Masami down to the core. She hid everything behind a calm smile and a polite demeanor, so it was nearly always up in the air as to what her true feelings were.

It was a good thing Kyoya knew Masami better than anyone else in the world, because she didn't try and discuss her schemes with him.

He gave her space easily enough. He didn't press.

But, two weeks after their mother's return, Kyoya had finally had enough.

"Have you made up your mind yet?" he inquired over breakfast.

Her responding glance was blank. "Regarding?"

Kyoya snorted. Who did she think she was fooling? "Yourself."

The clank of her teacup as it settled on the chabudai was loud. "No," she said softly, "but I will when Sawada-san returns."

He nodded and returned to his breakfast.

Tsunayoshi returned soon enough, two days before Rika's flight out. He came tripping into Masami's office, babbling exasperatedly about mafia babies and an invasion, and she let him rant, noting down names and other pieces of useful information.

The Rain Arcobaleno was Colonello. He had a falcon partner, while the Cloud Arcobaleno rode around on a gigantic octopus and was called Skull. Colonello was a merciless Spartan trainer, and Skull was a bit dramatic but not really scary.

She looked at the boy she had known for such a long time, the boy she had nudged and pushed and trained until he had shaped up and became something more than that small, powerless victim huddled away in a corner of the playground.

She listened as he rambled about how Hayato and Takeshi had been so terribly enthusiastic about stopping the attack, and Tsunayoshi certainly didn't know how they'd done it, but with a lot of dynamite, some bullets, and a baseball bat, they'd succeeded.

She hadn't said anything about his bout of clumsiness, hadn't reprimanded him when he blubbered and waved his hands and spoke in run-on sentences. She didn't smile, and maybe that was particularly out-of-character for her, because Tsunayoshi abruptly stopped and stared hard.

"Masami-san?" he said softly, tentatively. "Are you alright? I — Did something happen?"

Her gaze dropped to her desk, bare for the first time in what seemed like an eternity although she knew it had only been a few months, and then out the window, where students mingled and laughed, and beyond them, where the open road stretched and called.

And she knew that her mother was right. He would be just fine without her.

"Come back tomorrow, Sawada-san," Masami requested. "With your friends, please. I'll tell you then."

Tetsuya lived and breathed loyalty. He had made up his mind a long time ago to follow Hibari Kyoya, and when Hibari Masami had come as part of the package, he had given her his loyalty without pause as well.

There were a lot of things Tetsuya knew about the Hibari siblings that few others knew.

He knew that Kyoya had a soft spot for animals, for he frequently gathered up injured birds and squirrels and nursed them back to health. He knew that Masami was nowhere near as unruffled as she made herself appear, because when she was upset, it was his job to make her hot chocolate.

He knew, but his loyalty had never wavered.

Tetsuya was older than Kyoya, older than Masami, and that meant while he depended on their strength, he also took care of them in ways that he doubted they would allow anyone else.

He kept Kyoya from doing something he might regret later on, ran interference between the Skylark and the rest of Namimori Middle. He pushed Masami to eat and drink when she was caught up with paperwork, reprimanded the boys when she needed a break.

So, when Masami appeared in his doorway at the break of dawn, face serious, tone intent, but more relaxed than he'd seen for far too long, Tetsuya didn't hesitate to agree. That year before she had arrived in Namimori Middle had been tedious but not overly so.

They would be fine.

Masami spent the earlier part of the afternoon taking a nap with Kyoya in the gardens. Summer was running its course, but the breeze was nice and it was cool enough in the shade. He folded up his jacket for a pillow, and she slept on his stomach, and it was almost like they were children again.

It had always been them, just them.

Yes, in their childhoods, their parents had been there, but even then, it had been Kyoya and Masami alone at home more often than not. Then, Satoshi and Rika had left, and it had truly been just them against the world.

Kyoya had never once told Masami he loved her and vice versa. But he protected her when he could, and she looked after him when she could, and neither of them put much stock in words anyways. A hundred small actions were clear as day and much more believable.

"This won't be the first time," she murmured into the quiet.

He didn't open his eyes. "Hn."

"I don't know when I'll be back."

"No, you don't."

"I'm leaving you with the herbivores."

"Masami."

She laughed and smiled. "Take care of yourself, Onii-san."

"Keep your fangs sharp while you're gone," he replied softly.

Tsuna honestly wasn't sure what was going on as he fidgeted nervously on the couch in Masami's office. Gokudera was sitting to his right, playing around with a cigarette but not lighting it, while Yamamoto was to his left, relaxed and smiling.

Masami slipped inside the room without a word and closed the door behind her. She took a seat across from them and simply waited, calm and patient as always. She was smiling as she hadn't been when he last saw her though, gentle and warm, and there was a mesmerizing clarity to her eyes, the tilt of her sharp chin proud once more.

Tsuna relaxed, even though he wasn't sure why. If he closed his eyes, he could almost imagine the elementary school's rooftop spreading around them, and the most powerful girl he knew, so graceful and confident, telling him about the history of France.

Intuitively, he knew that she had decided, even though he didn't know what her decision was, even though he hadn't known that there was a decision at all.

He had acknowledged to himself that he would probably never know her as well as he would like, but that didn't mean he hadn't noticed the way his friend had been just a little off lately. He hadn't been able to pin it down exactly, but maybe, maybe even she had gotten a bit lost this time.

Tsuna didn't know. It was Masami, after all. Just like Reborn was inexplicable and terrible and unpredictable, Masami kept things close to her chest and was lovely like silk until you went too far and touched the steel.

"Masami-san?" he asked lowly, at ease now but still curious.

"Don't keep Juudaime waiting!" Gokudera snapped but it was less hostile than normal. "What do you want, maiko witch?"

She tilted her head to the side, kanzashi swaying. "Sawada-san, you still have my number, yes?"

Tsuna blinked, rapidly getting out his phone with clumsy fingers. "Hai! Uh, why?"

"Share it with Gokudera-san and Yamamoto-san, please."

"Ahhh... okay."

"What's up, Masami?" Yamamoto questioned, typing the number into his own phone. "This is kinda a surprise."

She closed her eyes briefly. "I'm going to be taking leave for an unspecified amount of time."

Tsuna yelped, almost dropping his phone in his surprise. "What!?"

"You heard me." Masami's gaze was sympathetic, knowing but unyielding.

"Bu-But—" Tsuna shook his head sharply, trying to get his thoughts in order, but it was impossible, because this was Masami. She was the one person he had never expected to just leave, not when she had always, always been there. "I don't—"

The words wouldn't come. What was he even trying to do? Convince her to stay? Since when had Tsuna ever changed Masami's mind? She did as she pleased, and he couldn't bear the thought that she would lose that freedom, because he knew, like he knew Gokudera was loyal and Yamamoto loved baseball, that it was important to her.

"So what?" Gokudera's voice came out cutting and almost cold, and Tsuna...Tsuna hadn't seen that look on his friend's face since the day Gokudera had tried to kill him. "You're just going to ditch? Can't take the heat? Well, fine, we don't want you any — "

"Gokudera-kun," Tsuna said, aghast, seconds before Yamamoto cut in, "Hey, hey, let's all calm down, alright?"

Gokudera fell silent, but he flicked open his lighter and lit his cigarette. Tsuna glanced anxiously between Gokudera and Masami, but the latter hadn't even batted an eyelash.

"Masami." Yamamoto looked at her, easy but firm. "Why are you leaving?"

"I can't stay," Masami replied evenly, and it was hard to tell whether she was affected by Gokudera's words or not.

Tsuna frowned, confused and upset and wanting more than anything to make this — everything — right again. "Why not?" Because if someone was making her do this, then he would make them pay. He was still weaker than she was. Less experienced, less mature, less capable, but Tsuna would make whoever it was regret it.

Masami inspected him for a long heartbeat. "Because that's what I need," she said at last.

It was a short answer. It should have been an insufficient answer, but those words resonated with something inside Tsuna, and looking at that familiar, beloved face, he knew she hadn't lied.

So Tsuna blew out a breath and said, "Okay."

"Juudaime?" Gokudera questioned incredulously.

At the exact same time, Yamamoto asked, "Tsuna?"

"It's okay," Tsuna said, and he glanced around at his friends, making sure they knew he wasn't lying either. "You'll come back if we call, right?"

Because she always had. Whether it had been yakuza or hitmen or corpses, even when she was tired and had better things to do, Masami had never turned Tsuna away. It was one of the few certainties in his life, and he didn't want to lose that.

And he wouldn't.

Masami smiled, and it was just like before, before Reborn and the Mafia and even Gokudera and Yamamoto. Just Sawada Tsunayoshi and Hibari Masami sitting on that rooftop. "Of course."

There was a beat and then Yamamoto laughed and Gokudera huffed but put out his cigarette, and Tsuna was content.

It was surprisingly easy to leave the only place she had ever considered home, even if it was a constricting home.

Masami packed her bags the night before, slept fitfully, woke up at dawn, and walked out, sparing a minute or two to inform Kyoko and Hana she was going on vacation. (They were planning on leaving for the beach themselves.)

Rika led her to the train station, and thirty minutes later, they were on a plane and thousands of meters in the air.

Looking down through the window — of course they were in first class, Rika had standards — she watched the world, so small, so beautiful, fly past her, and she couldn't bring herself to regret a thing with the earth stretching out beneath her and possibilities at her fingertips.

Osaka was as stunning as she had always expected. Rika was here for a job, naturally, but she took the time to settle her daughter in a hotel and give her instructions before absconding for reconnaissance. Then, it was just Masami and wherever her feet wanted to take her.

And she adored that.

Masami fell asleep with that euphoria in mind and woke up with bright eyes. It was uncomfortable living in a hotel, and she found their bathroom positively disgraceful, but it was worth it to be able to step out of the front doors and explore at well.

Namimori was a town, and Osaka was a city, and there had never been such a time that Masami was ever more aware of the difference. Skyscrapers were everywhere, reaching greedily for the faraway sky. People streamed here and there in crowds that never failed to sweep her away, and she made no move to dig her feet in.

That first day, she did nothing but follow the wind and the sun, wandering the streets freely. That was how Masami discovered the joys of okonomiyaki, and to the stall owner's delight, ordered several more. Takoyaki was interesting, too, just not as delicious as okonomiyaki.

Briefly, she lamented that Kyoya wasn't here with her, but then a flashing sign alerted her to the presence of a nearby shopping district, and she got distracted. They had such gorgeous kimonos.

When Masami finally stumbled back to the hotel, smiling widely, it was late, and she couldn't help but whirl around and take a picture of the lights, from her left and right, from above her and above her, golden and magenta and sapphire.

She would make sure to get a picture of the skyline before she left, she vowed to herself, and then collapsed in bed after rushing through her nighttime routine.

Masami ignored the eyebrow Rika raised at her in amusement. At least their room didn't smell of blood yet. Just before she went to sleep, she sent the picture to Kyoya and Tsunayoshi.

She was asleep before they could respond.

"So many herbivores. Bite them all to death."

"I'm on vacation, Onii-san."

"That looks beautiful. I'm happy you're having fun, Masami-san."

"Thank you, Sawada-san. How are you doing?"

Masami spent her second to ninth day doing all of the cliche tourist gigs. She visited Osaka Castle, paid her respects at the Sumiyoshi Grand Shrine, and watched a performance at the National Bunraku Theater. She shopped in the Minami and admired the organisms in the Osaka Aquarium. She even indulged herself and bought postcards for everyone.

On the tenth day, Rika swept into the room with a vengeance and slammed three books in front of Masami. She only blinked at her mother, taking a peek at the clock. It was five minutes to eight o'clock at night.

Arching an eyebrow, Masami questioned, "Okaa-san?"

"We're going to Spain in four days," Rika informed her. "I expect you to be ready." And then she was gone, leaving Masami with a book on culture, a book on basic language, and a book on proper etiquette.

Masami stared at the stack for a good five minutes before snapping out of her trance with a sigh. Well, Tetsuya and Kyoya might be covering for her back home, but Rika had been explicit: she was to keep up with her schoolwork. And really, this was merely an extension of that condition.

Besides.

She liked to learn about different cultures. And it would be embarrassing if she couldn't speak of word of their language when she reached Spain.

Smiling wryly, Masami reached out and cracked open the first book.

Spanish, as it turned out, was somewhat similar to Italian, which she'd already been exposed to. Among their group, Masami had been far from the most talented with languages — that had been Hayato, the-genius-who-wouldn't-do-anything-with-his-talents — but she hadn't been the least talented, either; that had been Yamamoto.

By the time she managed to make it through all three books, she had a headache and the sun was sinking down the horizon.

Masami sighed, rubbing at her temple with her fingers. Well, she figured, at least she could finally take the picture of the skyline at night like she wanted.

"Why did you send me such a useless card?"

"You're very welcome, Onii-san. That's tradition and history on there."

"Thank you very much for the beautiful postcard, Masa-san."

"You've very welcome, Kusakabe-san. I trust that everything is fine back at home?"

"Thanks for the postcard, Masami-san! Ah, what should I do with it?"

"You're very welcome, Sawada-san. If you'd like, you're welcome to use it for target practice."

"Didn't I tell you to stop bothering me, maiko witch!?"

"You're very welcome, Gokudera-san. I'll endeavor to send more appropriate gifts next time."

"Haha, thanks for the gift! My dad wanted to send back sushi, but I told him that it would spoil before reaching you."

"You're very welcome, Yamamoto-san. That's quite alright, no harm done. I appreciate the thought."

On the final night of Osaka, Rika came back with a cold smile and watchful eyes and blood-soaked clothes. Masami was prepared to turn her head away, to pretend she hadn't seen a thing, but her mother inquired, "Do you know how to remove blood from clothes?"

Masami paused. She knew how to remove blood stains, but Rika's dress was positively dripping blood all over the floor. At least it wasn't carpet. She shook her head. "No, Okaa-san."

Rika nodded and stripped off her dress without hesitation. Throwing the dress into the sink, she glided off to take a shower. While Rika washed off the blood, Masami eyed the red droplets on the floor and wondered if she should take care of it now.

Probably not, she decided. Rika would want to make a lesson out of this.

Masami was correct. Stepping fluidly out of the shower in a black yukata, Rika gestured for Masami to come closer and then began to instruct her on the proper removal of questionable fluids from porous and nonporous surfaces.

There was, Masami thought that night before slipping off into a dreamless sleep, no one like an assassin to teach you how to hide evidence of murder.

"The herbivores continue to crowd and be useless. Also, the paperwork is intolerable."

"My condolences, Onii-san. Perhaps you can dance with some of the yakuza? They're a bit unruly nowadays."

"More languages, huh? Sounds tough. Gokudera still shouts at me for speaking Italian wrong, hahaha."

"Have you made progress? I will admit, the many accents of Spanish are difficult."

Immediately after they had resettled themselves in a hotel — just as uncomfortable and just as worthwhile as the last one — Rika turned around and scanned her daughter critically. "Your attire needs to change. It's too obvious."

Masami considered the casual silver yukata she wore, the kanzashi that dangled from her hair, and how very Japanese her entire outfit was. This area didn't lack in tourists, but... "Hai. Would you do me the favor of acquiring more suitable clothes, Okaa-san?"

Rika nodded sharply and left. Half an hour later, she handed Masami a white blouse and a long blue skirt. Moving behind her, she deftly plucked out the kanzashi and simply let her black waist-length hair fall down her back freely.

The girl in the bathroom mirror was strangely unfamiliar.

Masami suppressed the automatic flinch, feeling strangely guilty. It wasn't as if she was betraying Japanese culture, blending in was important, so there was no reason for her to feel this way. And yet...

"You'll adjust," Rika assured her, meeting her eyes in the glass. "The formal greeting here is 'hola, ¿cómo está?'. Don't bow when outside of Japan, curtsy; I've taught you how. I will give you one week to become at ease with this culture. And then you shall join me on my mission."

Masami froze. "If I may inquire why, Okaa-san?"

"You have many career choices ahead of you," Rika murmured levelly, drifting away. "However, knowing how to properly assassinate someone never hurts. You have the talent for it, in any case."

Masami wondered what it said about her and her mother that a compliment like that made her smile faintly. But then, that was the Hibari family for you.

Madrid was lovely.

Albeit, it would have been lovelier if Masami could understand more than one in ten words, but cultural immersion was also a lovely thing. The people here were all used to tourists and friendly enough not to laugh at her fumbling attempts at Spanish. Some of them even kindly corrected her pronunciation, which she accepted graciously.

More startling was the cultural disparity, because people here were so very loud and open and intimate with each other, and reading about it could never match up to the reality.

In the Mercado de San Miguel, there was food she had never tried, food she had never known existed, and she didn't hesitate to buy a small sample when something caught her eye. Churros were a new love that she refused to give up, and flans were simply a pleasure.

Art, she learned, was major in Madrid. The Museo Reina Sofia was captivating, although, to be quite honest, Masami had never been much of an artist, far more interested in music. The Retiro Park was an invigorating experience, tranquil and exquisite enough to lull her into a half-nap.

She took pictures when she could, reveled in the energy and zeal that surrounded the city, noting that Ryohei would probably enjoy this place.

But what Masami loved the most were the dances.

The dances and the gowns and the music. Salsa was the best, she thought dreamily, more than happy to watch the performers dance the night away in one of the lesser-populated areas she'd found. There was just such a spirit in Latin dancing that classical dances lacked.

One of the local dancers caught her watching and laughed, warm and bright. Grabbing Masami by the hands, she drew her smoothly into the circle of music and taught her the steps, moving with a sensuality and passion she couldn't hope to match.

"Bueno, bueno," the woman praised and spun her wildly.

Masami laughed, happy.

"Your herbivores are too much trouble. Why do you put up with them?"

"Apologies, Onii-san. I did warn you."

"Masami-san, someone tried to murder me today! I think it was a hit, that's what it's called, right!?"

"Seeing as you're texting me, I'll assume you're still alive. Congratulations."

"Maiko witch, stop sending me fucking random pictures from who-knows-where! I don't care!"

"Thank you for your advice, I'll keep that in mind."

"So, hey, Gokudera got turned into a kid yesterday! It was pretty cool. We even played a game of catch!"

"That does sound very interesting, yes."

In many ways, Masami wasn't moral in the manner that most people were. That was to say, if a psychiatrist were to spend some time with her, they would most likely diagnose her as somewhat psychopathic. She was fully aware of this.

Partially, it was because of how she was raised. The Hibari Clan had no tolerance for weakness, and mercy, while useful, was ultimately for herbivores. Bloodlust was accepted, if not encouraged, and rules and laws were more of a pesky obstacle than anything to be taken seriously.

There was also the fact that, innately, Masami was an eminently practical person regarding most matters. She had kept Kyoya from killing for so long simply because it would have brought trouble from the police, not out of any sense of righteous ethics.

In that same line of thought, if there were no consequences, if the world was better off with someone dead than alive, if they weren't one of hers, even by association, and the best possible solution was murder...then that was fine with her.

However, psychopathic or not, she was still an innocent to death. Which was, now that she thought about it, the real reason her mother had forced her to come along. There was a time and a place for freaking out, and on the battlefield wasn't it.

The mission went well, or as well as an assassination could go. Rika disguised herself as an entertainer in the more elegant parts of the city, having pulled several strings to get there, while Masami was recruited as a waitress, whose only real job was to pretend to be busy and discreetly observe the scene.

Ten minutes in, the target arrived.

Masami had always known that her mother was a talented assassin, but it had been a distant knowledge, similar to how she knew penguins lived in the South Pole. For the first time, she was blatantly slapped in the face with the understanding that Rika was a well-versed professional killer.

It was an...experience.

There weren't any flaws in her mask at all, or at least, none that her daughter could detect. Wearing a wig which gifted with her curly brown hair and flaunting amber eyes, in a black dress that fit her like a glove, Rika smiled with rose-tinted lips and batted thick lashes accentuated with dark eyeshadow. She was warm, sophisticated, and charming. Her smile was radiant and her bearing immaculate. Spanish flowed freely from her lips, the accent localized and perfect, while she steadily intoxicated the man with offerings of hard alcohol.

When Rika led him outside, Masami followed.

The moon hung beautiful and wise in the night sky, paid court by shimmering, faraway stars. The faint moonlight glinted off of the knife that appeared in Rika's hand for the shortest second before it swiped across her target's throat and the blood spray went everywhere.

What was once clean air became tainted by copper.

"My client is a pretentious man," Rika told Masami lightly in Japanese, letting the man topple over with a grunt. "He wants to make a scene."

"I see." Dimly, she was aware that her voice came out softer than it should have.

"For the money, this job is on the easy side of the spectrum," Rika continued, flicking the blood off of her knife. It disappeared rapidly up her sleeve, and she turned around to smile at her daughter. "It was relatively straightforward, was it not?"

Masami watched the life fade from the man's eyes and pressed her lips together. "Hai."

"Come along now. The authorities will be here by dawn."

When they returned to the hotel, Rika casually donning a stylish coat to conceal the red on her dress, Masami strolled to their room without a hitch in her stride, her smile polite and bland.

She stepped into the bathroom and huddled under the shower spray for an hour, lingering long after the water had turned cold, shivering the entire time. Rika was back to her immaculate self when Masami stepped out, a cup of hot chocolate in her hands.

"You'll adapt," Rika said.

Masami was sure she would. Perhaps what frightened her the most was that she could feel nothing but apathy for the man her mother had killed.

...he had simply been so weak.

(Of course, in the end, her mother would be right. By the time the third corpse landed at her feet, Masami would be entirely unaffected.)

"The herbivores never cease crowding on Tanabata."

"It is a festival, Onii-san."

"Masami-san, Reborn is being as ridiculous as ever!"

"I presume your training is going well then."

"Your Italian is still atrocious. Spanish isn't helping."

"Thank you for your concern, Gokudera-san."

"Hey, so how's Spain? It is fun?"

"Yes. Spain has been amusing."

"You're already learning Italian, right?" Rika shrugged on a silk jacket and tossed a scarf over her neck. Colorful earrings were hanging from her ears, and she deftly slipped her feet into black high heels.

Masami watched her, sitting on the side of her bed. "Hai," she said, emotionless. After the violence of the previous night, everything seemed a bit muted, a little less innocuous than before. If her mother noticed, she didn't mention it.

Instead, Rika said, "We're going to Italy in two days. Be ready," and swept out the door.

Wandering around Madrid calmed Masami down a bit. She allowed the bustle and life of the city to soothe her conflicted emotions and wash the imprint of crimson away. She lost herself in the music and the dancing and let her feet carry her where they may.

Forty-eight hours passed in a blur and then she was on a plane once more, the night sky a cool indigo beyond her window, peaceful and bloodless and boring.

Venice was a place of beauty and history, intricate gondolas and waterfront palazzos.

After being settled in a hotel and left by Rika, Masami didn't hesitate to envelop herself in the city's romantic atmosphere and fascinating culture. It was a wonderful distraction, at the very least, and her lack of fluency or otherwise, she was going to enjoy her time here.

The architecture caught her attention first. St. Mark's Basilica appeared more of a work of art than anything functional, and she wasn't in the least bit interested in religion, but she snapped some photos nonetheless. Gallerie dell'Accademia was an actual house of art, and she happily spent hours there observing the displays.

Italian food was...interesting. Masami had known of pizza before of course, but there was just something different about the authentic dish. She wasn't certain she liked it, but she didn't regret trying it. Pasta was more suited to her tastes, and the seafood here was magnificent.

When Masami fell asleep that night, her rest was plagued by nothing more than flares of dancing purple light.

As the sun rose, she drank coffee in St. Mark's Square and closed her eyes to better listen to the enthusiastic chatter going on around her. A trip to Palazzo Ducale took up the rest of her morning, and she spent her afternoon admiring the Murano, buying a few glass trinkets here and there. Rather than going back to the hotel as night fell, Masami explored the Grand Canal and sighed at the Rialto Bridge.

When she finally returned to her room, Rika was waiting. "Now that you've gotten that out of your system," she said primly, seated cross-legged on her bed, "it's time for you to gain control of your Flames."

"Meditation?"

"Meditation."

"The Summer Festival, if at all possible, was worse."

"I'm glad you're enjoying yourself, Onii-san."

"Why are you in Venice? Are you at least learning good Italian?"

"Vacation. I would hardly be a good judge, Gokudera-san."

Tsuna had been getting used to Namimori without Masami around. It hadn't been easy at all, but there was Reborn, Gokudera, and Yamamoto to distract himself with, and to his surprise, Tsuna had realized that it wasn't quite as monstrously difficult as he had imagined.

He sometimes wondered, in the back of his mind, how long this had been in coming and what clues he had missed.

Because even when word spread in school that Masami was gone — the rumors were ridiculous — Gokudera and Yamamoto were there to keep the bullies off of Tsuna. Yamamoto was more subtle about it, usually with a laugh and an off-hand comment, but Gokudera just let loose with the dynamite.

It gave Tsuna headaches to even think about it.

At lunch, well, Masami had been pretty busy with her prefect duties for a while now. He almost couldn't remember the last time she'd sat with them on a day that wasn't close to a particularly important test. And the silence and space were more than taken up by Gokudera and Yamamoto.

On the other hand, there was Hibari. Hibari, who, Tsuna was terrified to note, was five hundred percent more pissed off than before now that his sister wasn't there to keep the peace or provide whatever it was that was needed to calm the beast. What that meant for Tsuna mostly? Knocking on the Hibari Mansion door, getting greeted with a death glare, and being beat up even worse than usual. Recently, Hibari had even started dragged Yamamoto and Gokudera into their spars.

The outcome remained the same, of course — it was The Hibari Kyoya — but that did mean fewer bruises for Tsuna.

It also resulted in them being thrown out after the spars were over, not tea and conversation, but he would take what he could get.

Out of everything, Tsuna thought that he missed the cool confidence and unbiased advice that Masami had given him the most. Before Reborn, before anyone else, she had been the one who had looked at him and decided that he could, would, be someone better than just Dame-Tsuna, and her presence had always reminded him of that. Not that he needed anyone to tell him to keep his back straight and his head held high nowadays, not when it had become habit sometime when he wasn't looking, but the memo had been appreciated.

Occasionally, when Tsuna was feeling particularly introspective, he would miss Masami's lack of favoritism. Reborn was probably the least prejudiced after she was, but even he came in after she had whipped Tsuna into shape. Yamamoto saw Tsuna as the guy who had saved his life, and Gokudera...was Gokudera. Masami, though, Masami looked at him, all of him, the Tsuna before and after she had glided into his life. She didn't put him on a pedestal or let him give anything but his best, and when she talked to him, she was talking to Sawada-san, not the Vongola Decimo, or the Hero-In-Dying-Will.

In that way, Masami had always been neutral, and Tsuna was unspeakably grateful to her for it.

There was also something to be said for having someone around who, while maddeningly impossible and implacable, valued normalcy and was mostly sane.

But Masami seemed happy, judging by the text messages and the small gifts that showed up in his mailbox every few weeks or so. And Tsuna was happy for his friend, because she deserved everything the world had to offer.

There was that, and also the mayhem raging in Namimori. Hibari might oversee their training, but he didn't keep a close eye on them, not like Masami did. Consequently, Hibari didn't catch most of the antics Reborn pulled out of his hat before Reborn magically made the smoking craters and wrecked property disappear.

Kami-sama only knew what Masami would have done if she had been forced to deal with all of them.

"Hey, Tsuna!" Yamamoto leaned his elbow on his shoulder, cheerful smile dull today. "Did you see the news yet?"

"News...?" That didn't bode well. In fact, when did that ever bode well?

"Yeah." Yamamoto placed a newspaper on the table in front of him. "It's pretty brutal."

"Namimori Student Viciously Attacked! Missing Every Last One Of His Teeth!"

Tsuna's stomach dropped. Then, his heart stuttered when he caught sight of the picture. "Oh no," he whispered, eyes wide. "It's one of the prefects."

Ring~ Ring~ Ring~

"Greetings, Onii-san."

"Masami. I need you back in Namimori."

"...understood. I'll be back by tomorrow."

When Masami stepped foot on Namimori soil once more, she was beset by a sudden surge of discomfort. Of being weighed down once more in a way she'd never been in Spain or Italy or even Osaka, of being chained and leashed and restricted, and she hated it.

As always, she focused on the fact that her brother was here, that he needed something or another, and allowed that to crush her urge to run and run and never come back.

At least the kanzashi and yukata were familiar and comforting.

Plastering a courteous smile on her lips, Masami strolled down the street. Here and there, someone called out a greeting and a welcome back, and it was full circle now, wasn't it? Her time away from this cage hadn't been nearly long enough, but she swallowed that down and nodded politely in response.

It was a relief when she walked back onto Hibari land. Hotels were convenient, but they were uncomfortable, and there was a perpetual touch of sterility to their rooms that made her wary.

Rika had also very helpfully shown her the many, many ways someone could get assassinated in a hotel, so that hadn't helped.

Masami slipped soundlessly into her house and breathed a sigh of relief, the last line of tension falling from her shoulders. She covered a yawn, already mentally calculating how long it would take her to get used to the different time zone. Previously, it hadn't really mattered since the nighttime activities had been just as entertaining as the daytime activities, but things were obviously different back here.

Sparing a glance at the clock, she concluded that it would take Kyoya a few more hours to make it back from Namimori Middle, so Masami took the liberty of taking a nice, hot shower and collapsing in her futon after asserting that everything in the house was as it should be.

After all of the travel, after the blood, after the jetlag, it was much too easy to fall asleep.

"Masami."

She woke as the sun was setting, the warm glow of it traveling along the tatami mats. Blinking sleep out of her eyes, she registered the figure standing above her. "Onii-san. Greetings," Masami muttered huskily, sitting up and running a hand through her hair. "What time is it?"

"Eight," Kyoya said, crisp and clear. "Dinner's ready." With that, he turned and left her room, sliding the screen shut behind him.

She processed that for a moment, picking up her gunsen, which had been lying on the mat next to her futon, and spreading it idly. It didn't take long for her to get dressed, and when they sat down to eat, it was as if she had never left.

If one ignored the dangerous spark in Kyoya's eyes, of course.

It was after dinner, with all of the dishes washed and dried, when Masami said, "What happened?"

Without a word, he placed the newspaper down on the table. She picked it up and scanned the article, eyes narrowing when she recognized the prefect.

Kamisaka was particularly devoted when training. He loved to eat ramen and hated paperwork, and he was one of theirs.

"Is he still alive?"

"Barely."

Faintly, she frowned and wondered if she could have prevented this. Wondered if, had she been less selfish, had she stayed and devoted her time to training those poor herbivores, this could have been avoided.

It was an ugly thought. And she saw it reflected in her brother's eyes, entwined with the territorial rage of an apex predator and the self-castigation of a pack leader.

Tsuna first realized Masami was back in Namimori when the front doors were gently opened, not wrenched apart, and a familiar voice said, "Greetings."

Head snapping up, Tsuna promptly lit up like fireworks. "Masami-san! You're back!" Casting a careful eye over his classmate, he found her looking pretty much the same, although her smile was sweeter than before.

Whether that was a good sign or a bad sign, he didn't know.

At his right side, Gokudera jolted, a quicksilver scowl flitting over his face as his eyes sharpened into a glare. "Tch, why did she have to come back?" he complained under his breath but it was half-hearted.

At his left side, Yamamoto laughed, grinning openly. "Hey, welcome back! How have you been?"

Reborn merely peered up at the girl without any hint of surprise. "Ciaossu, Masami."

Masami wore a loose black yukata, her hair held up by kanzashi that looked like streams of red flowers. She smiled, quietly pleased. "So I am. Thank you, I've been well." Turning, she invited them inside with a flicker of silk. "Onii-san's not back yet, I'm afraid," she said conversationally as she led the way to the sitting room.

Tsuna blinked, putting aside his joy at having his first friend back to try and puzzle out this oddity. On the weekends, especially this early in the morning, Hibari had always been at home, as far as he could remember.

"Where is he?" Yamamoto piped up, linking his hands behind his head.

She glanced back at them, smiling enigmatically. "Busy with another affair."

Tsuna thought about what would draw Masami back to Namimori when she'd been plainly happier outside, what would occupy Hibari of all people, and gulped.

"You've heard about the attacks then," Gokudera summarized, echoing Tsuna's thoughts.

"Sadly, yes." Masami's voice remained calm and even, but there was an edge there, frosty and lethal, that made Tsuna shiver. An angry Masami was a scary Masami, no matter how happy he was to have her back.

It was almost a relief when they entered the familiar room, the steaming tea exactly where it normally was, the books set along the table. Unlike usual, Tsuna wasn't a sweating, panting, hurting mess when he collapsed on the zabuton, but that was an excellent thing in his book.

"Alright," Gokudera grumbled, heaving a long-suffering sigh. "Let's see what you've done to your Italian now."

Yamamoto snickered.

Masami offered an innocent smile that didn't make Tsuna feel better at all.

Half an hour later, in the middle of groaning his way through yet another Mafia Boss Lesson, while Gokudera shouted at Yamamoto because apparently Masami's Italian was now leagues better than theirs and Gokudera found that personally offensive, Tsuna flinched, book falling to the ground, as something screamed a warning inside of his head.

"Juudaime!?" Gokudera called immediately, worried. "What's wrong!?"

"I...I don't..." Tsuna shook his head, suddenly finding it hard to breathe. His lungs didn't seem to want to cooperate. "I..."

"Ah." Masami flowed to her feet, snapping open her fan in one smooth movement. Her brief glance at Tsuna was speculative. "Onii-san's back."

It sounded like a death sentence.

Tsuna went five shades paler and swayed a little, alarms all but blaring in his skull. No one wanted to be around when The Hibari Kyoya was angry...and for some reason, Tsuna was fairly certain that he was furious right now. Tsuna needed to run, he should have run, it was too late to run —

The screen was shoved open. Hibari stood in the doorway, face blank, shoulders tense, and tonfa in hand. Killing intent infused the air, thick and noxious, and oh Kami, Tsuna really couldn't breathe now.

He was so going to die.

"What. The. Fuck." Gokudera rasped out, mouth thin and white, fingers curled around his dynamite.

From the corner of his eye, Tsuna noticed Reborn's mysterious absence and the new sharpness in Yamamoto's eyes.

Meanwhile, Masami only smiled and bowed, perfectly composed. "Greetings, Onii-san."

Hibari glared. Tsuna tried not to sob. "Masami," the prefect purred slowly, and it was a brutal request.

"Hai, hai." Masami waited until Hibari had prowled away before smiling at Tsuna and the others. "Come along now. I don't think you'll want to miss this."

On the contrary, Tsuna was dead-certain he did want to miss this — whatever 'this' was — but arguing with Masami was useless, so he just nodded and resigned himself to his doom.

"Woah, easy there," Yamamoto said as he steadied Tsuna when he wavered on his feet. Tsuna muttered his thanks and tried to brace himself for whatever come next.

It still didn't stop him from squeaking pathetically when he realized they were heading to the dojo

"Backs to the wall, please," Masami suggested, very gently, when they arrived and the door was closed by Reborn, who had appeared behind them with an unholy gleam in his eyes. Hibari stood on the other side of the room, eyes narrowed in anticipation. "This may get a bit messy."

Tsuna practically sprinted to obey, although once he was huddled against the wall, Gokudera and Yamamoto beside him, he rapidly realized the disparity between his actions and his surroundings. If he wasn't fighting Hibari, and his friends weren't fighting Hibari, and his tutor wasn't fighting Hibari, then...

Masami serenely approached her brother and stopped ten meters away. There were two fans in her hands, and daintily, she bowed. "Shall we dance?"

"Holy shit," Gokudera muttered, fingers fidgeting like he wanted to light a cigarette.

"Wow," Yamamoto commented, grinning. "This is going to be awesome."

"Pay attention, Dame-Tsuna," Reborn commanded.

Tsuna whimpered and tried to become one with the wall at his back.

Hibari hummed in response and slid into a combat position. There was a heartbeat of complete and utter silence. Even the birds outside stopped chirping. Tsuna held his breath, throat dry and heart pounding. For once, Gokudera, Yamamoto, and Reborn didn't jump in with sassy remarks.

Then, Hibari lunged forward, with all of the flawlessly controlled power and poise of a large cat, and Masami was spinning away, beautiful and elegant, and they were sparring, fighting, dancing, and Tsuna —

Tsuna didn't realize he was holding his breath until his lungs were screaming for air. Slowly, he inhaled, eyes still fixated on the pair. By his side, his friends were quiet, and so was Reborn. It was terribly hard to look away.

In some part of his mind, hidden behind his daily anxieties and worries and doubts, Tsuna had always been aware that Hibari was holding back when he spared with Tsuna. Otherwise, Tsuna would be a smear on the ground, after all, and Masami, well, Masami was in another category altogether.

Watching the two strongest people he knew fight was...magnificent, in a mildly horrifying way.

Swaying to the left and pivoting on her foot, Masami blocked and deflected four of Hibari's strikes and then smoothly snapped open her black fan, lashing out. Hibari wove under the deadly weapon, was coming up underneath her guard, but Masami wasn't there anymore, her footwork intricate and lightning-fast. The white fan was swinging through the air, aimed at the back of Hibari's head, but he swung around, whacking it away with a tonfa. Its partner was already a silver blur, but Masami flipped backward, yukata offering no restriction to her fluidity, and they were moving again.

The smash of a tonfa on the wooden ground caused Tsuna to flinch instinctively, but Masami merely pushed off, righted herself in mid-air, only to use the wall as a springboard and crash herself directly into Hibari, who grunted and interlocked his tonfa against the assault.

Under the combined pressure, the floorboards beneath splintered slightly. There was first just a hint of a fissure, and then an almighty CRACK as a crater appeared below Hibari's feet.

"Hieeee," Tsuna whispered, eyes wide as saucers.

Disturbingly enough, Hibari only grinned and dug his feet in, pushing Masami away. She landed neatly on her feet and ducked under the tonfa aimed at her head, a foot darting out to catch around Hibari's ankle. Only, he was already gone, swinging a tonfa at her shoulder from her right.

Masami deflected it with ridiculous ease. Tsuna, who ended each spar with aching muscles and colorful bruises, despaired.

By now, their weapons were merely arcs of color in the air, metal glinting here and there, sparks flying where they collided. It was odd, because, in Tsuna's experience, everything slowed down as a fight progressed, but then, that was probably just his bad stamina speaking. Here, both Masami and Hibari only seemed to get faster as time went on. Attacking. Blocking. Ducking. Swirling and tossing and whirling and dancing.

Neither of them were holding back here and now, and death was a laughing murmur in the silence, the raw artistry of the Hibari Siblings almost but not quite taking away from the sheer danger.

The sharp edge of a fan a centimeter away from a vulnerable throat. A foot pulled back right before snapping a rib. The half-completed maneuver meant to break the spine. A tonfa aimed and almost smashed into an eyeball. The soft whisper of an edge a second too late to decapitate.

It was hard to comprehend everything that was happening, like watching a choreographed fight in fast forward. Just keeping up with what was going on took up most of his brain power, but, as Tsuna watched, he was reminded of a pair of predatory birds, darting around each other, over and under, left and right, perfectly synchronized. Other times, he thought they were more like wolves in a fight to the death, snapping at each other, teeth and claws, mother nature at its finest, most feral, but all the more beautiful in its savagery, and shivered.

Tsuna suspected he would be torn to shreds in milliseconds should he try to intervene.

Time became negligible, but once, and only once, Tsuna was able to tear his eyes away from the fight for a few seconds to sneak a glance at his companions.

Reborn was, as usual, unreadable, but his gaze was set firmly on the scene in front of them. There was an ear-piercing shriek of metal against metal a beat later, and Tsuna winced despite himself.

Gokudera was frowning, but he didn't seem to be angry. Instead, he tracked each movement of the two unerringly, head cocked to the side like a curious cat. There was a furrow in his brow, and Tsuna wondered what calculations were going through his friend's genius brain.

Yamamoto, though...

Yamamoto was grinning, bright and wide, eyes as sharp as blades and focused solely on the fight. There was a light to his face that Tsuna normally only saw during a particularly challenging baseball game, and he was clearly more exhilarated than afraid or anything sensible.

Tsuna exhaled slowly and cried tears inwardly. Why couldn't he have any normal friends!?

It could have been minutes, could have been hours, as Masami and Hibari fought on. It was hard to tell, especially since the training room was devoid of anything that could be destroyed, clock included. Tsuna was well aware that time never mattered much during a fight.

Finally, finally, Masami did something tricky with her fan and sent one of the tonfa sprawling on the floor, and Hibari stopped the remaining tonfa a centimeter from her throat. Tsuna gulped hard, feeling like his heart was racing out of his chest even though he hadn't even done anything.

Masami's smile was soft and pleased. She was breathing hard but not outright gasping. Bizarrely, most of her kanzashi were still perfectly in place and her yukata was only slightly rumpled, a thin, thin sheen of sweat on her pale skin. "Yield."

Hibari grinned, keen and toothy. He drew back smoothly, physical condition mirroring his sister's. "Investigate," he said curtly but the raw murderous intent from before was gone. Straightening up, he grabbed his tonfa and strolled out of the room, efficient and easy.

Masami hummed and deftly made her fans disappear. She glided over to the door, where the normal supplies were located, and sipped at a water bottle, rubbing a towel over her face, her neck, and wiping her hands. There was no hint of any difficulty or awkwardness in her movements.

Tsuna, who could fight against the head prefect for about ten minutes and practically crawled away from each session, despaired some more.

"Well then." Turning, she smiled at them, completely and utterly peaceful. "Let's get going, shall we?"

Chapter Text

Quickstep: a ballroom dance style that is energetic, form-intensive, and elegant with extremely quick stepping, danced to 4/4 music.

"Masami, what is this?" Kyoya eyed his plate disdainfully, with an added helping of confusion.

She smiled back serenely. "Paella. A Spanish dish."

His glare was spectacularly ineffective. "And why are we eating a Spanish dish!?"

Masami shrugged. "It's delicious." She had gained a very healthy appreciation for Spanish food during her time in Spain. "Consider this meal an exercise in broadening your cultural borders if you must."

Kyoya scowled darkly and ate his paella aggressively. There were, she noted a tad smugly, no actual complaints about the taste of the food. Really, it wasn't as if Masami didn't know what Kyoya liked and didn't like. There was no need for all of this doubt, not that it really mattered. He was distracted, and that, in the end, was what she had been aiming for.

The churros con chocolate were only a bonus.

Hayato stomped down the hallway with a scowl.

Two weeks had passed since the maiko witch had returned and things hadn't gotten better. If anything, things had only gotten worse as the casualties mounted up, most of them prefects and a heck of a lot them missing a bunch of their teeth. Unsurprisingly, Hibari, the homicidal psychopath, had only gotten more and more irritated as the days went on.

Hadn't Masami been reading up on anger management? Why hadn't she done anything about her crazy brother yet? Actually, now that he thought about it, the witch had been even more carefree with her damned fan than usual recently. Maybe they were both losing it?

Well, whatever. The point was, was that just about everyone in town was fucking on edge. Juudaime seemed terribly stressed nowadays, despite Hayato's best attempts to reassure him of his safety with his Right-Hand Man around, and even Yamamoto was carrying his metal bat around with him like the baseball idiot he was.

Today, just like on every other blasted Saturday, they were all at the Hibari Mansion. Hayato was still halfway convinced it was a secret Mafia Base. He just had to figure out where they were hiding the secret entrances.

Unlike normal, though, Masami had disappeared somewhere after inviting them inside. Juudaime was still doing his job as a spectacular Boss to get stronger by fighting against Hibari, but Reborn had dismissed Hayato instead of letting him throw dynamite at the baseball idiot, which was disappointing. It was usually a great stress reliever.

"I have another training program in mind for Yamamoto," Reborn had said mischievously. "Why don't you go find Masami? She might need some help."

So here Hayato was, trying to navigate his way through this absurdly complicated house in search of a witch who could have made her way to the moon by now. Really, if it had been anyone but the World's Strongest Hitman and Juudaime's mentor asking...

"Oi!" he called out because he was sick of wandering randomly down this hallway and that. Who knew what was lurking in this place? "Maiko witch! Get out here!"

No response. Tch, of course not. She just had to make things complicated for him. Hayato's scowl deepened. Stupid witch. Like hell he was going to let her win.

"OI — "

"Gokudera-san."

The voice was soft, exasperated, and came directly behind him.

Hayato would never, in a million years, confess to yelping, jumping a metre into the air, and whirling around, almost tripping over his own feet.

Masami, one hand on the shoji panel — where the hell did that come from; he swore it wasn't there a second ago — and silky pale pink yukata brushing the floor, arched an eyebrow at him that spoke plainly of being unimpressed.

He glowered. "You took your sweet time."

"So it seems." Turning away, she glided back into the room. "I assume Reborn-san sent you?"

"Yeah." Sighing, Hayato followed after her, well aware by now that losing his temper at Masami would only get him hit with a fan or outright ignored. "What the hell have you been doing anyway?" he asked before he was all the way in.

Silently, she gestured to the room with a wave of her arm.

It wasn't very impressive, he thought uncharitably at first. Then, his brain caught up and started picking elements apart and then, yeah, it became impressive.

The fusuma panels that acted as the walls were painted with falling cherry blossoms and white chrysanthemums and were pinned with random stuff. A single mahogany table in the middle dominated the room, encircled with seven heavy-looking chairs while two floor lamps flooded everything with warm light.

Which was great and normal and all, if it weren't for the fact that, in Japan, cherry blossoms brought to mind samurai and kamikaze pilots, white chrysanthemums were popular for funerals, the mahogany table held an open laptop, files, books — the top one The Art of fucking War — and a gigantic map, and the stuff pinned to the walls were very recent newspaper clippings.

"Maiko witch," Hayato said slowly, "is this a goddamn intelligence room!?"

Masami treated him to a coy, sweet smile that offered no reassurance at all and walked over to the table.

He frowned. "Witch — "

"Eighteen students," she murmured, cutting him off. There was no hint of anger on her face, but the underlying steel in her voice still sent a shiver down his spine. "All from Namimori Middle. Beaten, normally with broken bones. Teeth extracted, though the number varies."

Hayato blinked and walked a little closer. "Same M.O. for each one then?"

"Hai. And also..." Masami spread the files out across the table and over the map before beginning to switch them around purposefully. When she seemed to be satisfied, she took a step back and frowned slightly. "The number of teeth extracted is very...precise."

His curiosity won out over his distaste. Hayato moved to stand next to the witch and glanced over the files. They were the medical and school records of the victims, although he had no idea how she had gotten her hands on them. Wasn't this shit supposed to be confidential or something?

Then again, both Hibari and Masami held inordinate amounts of power in Namimori. Yet another sign in favor of the U.M.A/Secret Mafia Family theory.

Nonetheless, with everything in the order that it was, it only took him seconds to notice what she had. "Fuuuck," Hayato hissed, wishing he could light up a cigarette. "Descending or ascending?"

"Descending. Kamisaka-san was the first, and he lost every last one of his teeth. Odaka-san was attacked yesterday, and he lost fourteen of his teeth."

"What are they trying to do?" he demanded, spinning around to peer at the newspaper clippings. "What factor are they using to determine who gets attacked next?"

"Unknown. However, eighty percent of the victims have been prefects." Masami seated herself in the seat closest to the laptop and began to type something in the search engine she had running. For such a traditional person, she was a pretty fast typer. "Do you believe it is mafia related?"

Hayato grimaced at the memories that evoked. "Yeah. The Mafia are into twisted stuff like this." Finding nothing of importance in the newspapers, he settled down and began to skim the medical reports instead. He didn't want to admit it, but... "Juudaime's probably the target."

A pause, but when he looked up, the maiko witch's face was perfectly neutral. It was irritating. "Perhaps he should stay here more often then."

He bristled. "You saying you think I can't protect him!?"

"No." Her typing never faltered. "All the same, do you not agree that Sawada-san would be safer here?"

Just because Hayato could admit to himself that Hibari and Masami were far more powerful than he was, especially after that little display when the witch had first returned, didn't mean he would ever say it out loud. Instead, he scoffed. "Aren't you scared your house is going to get wrecked?"

Her small smile was knowing. "I think you'll find that my home is sturdier than you expect." Then, before he could retort, "Would you read Kamisaka-san's personal information to me, please?"

He stared. "What."

Masami sighed and glanced up at last, typing ceasing. "His year, height, weight, home address, after-school activities, and other relevant information."

Hayato narrowed his eyes. "You're trying to find a correlation between the victims."

"Hai. Now, if you would..."

He grumbled beneath his breath but picked up the file anyway.

By the time they got to Odaka, Hayato's voice was starting to go thin, and Masami's fingers were stumbling more often. "Done," he noted with relish, throwing the file back on the table and heaving a long sigh.

She was more conservative with her relief but exercised her wrists in slow circles and massaged lightly at her neck. "It's three," Masami muttered, rising out of her seat. "I suspect Sawada-san and Yamamoto-san are finished."

He glared half-heartedly. "Hey, I want the results, too!"

"Later," came the implacable answer, followed by the swish of silk as she slid open the shoji panel and quirked an eyebrow back at him over her shoulder.

Hayato rolled his eyes expressively but walked after her, strangely looking forward to the fine tea and language lessons despite knowing the baseball idiot would drive him crazy with his pronunciation again.

And, of course, he was right. On both accounts.

"Eeeh? We're staying for the rest of the afternoon?" Tsuna blinked, baffled at this sudden turn in the usual routine. Normally, after they'd had tea, snacks and learned some more Italian, they'd bid Masami goodbye and go back home.

"Problem, Dame-Tsuna?" Reborn smiled innocently up at him like his dark eyes weren't glinting malevolently. "Masami and Gokudera suggested it. I've already called Mamma."

"Hieee! No, no problem!" Tsuna denied frantically, possessing no desire whatsoever to see what damage those two could cause together. But...together? "Wait...Masami-san and Gokudera-kun hate each other!"

"Now, now, hate is a very powerful term." Reborn sipped at his coffee. "You should be happy they're getting along, you know. It's a Mafia Boss' job to make sure their subordinates are cooperating."

"Masami-san's not my subordinate!" Tsuna hissed, glancing around rapidly to make sure the prefect in question hadn't heard the derogatory remark. Thankfully, she still seemed to be preoccupied with her Italian grammar book. "And I'm not going to be a Mafia Boss!"

Reborn casually punched him in the stomach.

"Ooof!"

"Ouch, that looks like it hurt."

"Juudaime, are you okay!?"

"I-I'm fine," Tsuna gasped out, bent over with his hands clasped over his abdomen. Even though he couldn't see her from his position, he had the embarrassing feeling Masami was raising an eyebrow at him. Before anyone could say anything more, though, a beautiful piano melody sang through the air. It seemed familiar, but as Tsuna straightened up out of curiosity, he couldn't place it.

By his side, Gokudera stiffened slightly. Tsuna noticed, furrowing his brow in confusion, but as Masami snapped open her phone to take the call, the chance for an explanation passed.

"Greetings." A pause as she listened to whoever was on the line, and then a faint, faint frown that bode nothing well. "I see. Collect the necessary information, please. I presume Onii-san is there? ...yes, thank you. Goodbye."

"Another attack?" Gokudera asked before Masami had even fully ended the call.

"Three," she said crisply, knocking her tea back like it was a shot. Which, in Tsuna's experience, meant very, very bad things had happened.

Yamamoto propped his chin up on his fist. "Sounds like it's getting pretty bad."

"See, Dame-Tsuna?" Reborn's face was unreadable. "Aren't you happy you get to stay here?"

Tsuna couldn't help but shudder.

Masami noticed — of course, she did — and smiled politely, all agitation dissipating instantly like fog on a cold morning. She rose to her feet. "I expect Onii-san to be busy until late at night, so you all are welcome to stay until then. Please feel free to relax and move about at your leisure. That said, I'd be very grateful if you don't make a mess."

"And where are you going?" asked Gokudera, very suspiciously.

She hummed, pausing momentarily at the shoji screen. "I'm going to take a walk outside," Masami said. "If you need me, just yell."

"Hey, Masami." Takeshi took a seat on the engawa, grinning his appreciation at the zen garden that spread out before him. It was beautiful, but then, he'd expected less from the Hibari Mansion. It was, he suspected, something of a point of honor, like how his dad refused to prepare his sushi with the more modern methods.

Masami smiled, clearly more at ease after her 'walk outside'. He was glad; this contented mood was why he had decided to wait a good half an hour before searching her out. Her legs dangled over the colorful wildflowers. "Greetings, Yamamoto-san."

He leaned back, holding himself up with hands pressed flat against the smooth wood. "Fall's coming, huh?" Takeshi watched the leaves, blazing red and golden yellow and sienna orange, drift in the wind, one perfect maple leaf coming to rest gently on the surface of the pond.

It floated easily, spinning this way and that. A curious koi came up to nudge it gently.

"Hai." Reaching up, Masami plucked a leaf out of the air and twirled it by the stem. It was a gorgeous deep crimson. Inexplicably, Takeshi was reminded of Gokudera. Must be because of the temper. "I assume you have a question for me, Yamamoto-san?"

He smiled sheepishly, pretty much caught red-handed...no pun intended. "Yeah, I guess so." Swinging his legs like a child, Takeshi considered how to put his thoughts into words. This had been coming for a while, he knew. The recent attacks had just been the final catalyst. "The guys that are attacking our classmates..." he started slowly, "they're strong, aren't they?"

"Strong," she repeated, as if testing the word out to see if it fit. "Yes, they're strong, and quite intelligent, for that matter."

Oh, Takeshi thought, so that was what Masami and Gokudera were doing earlier. From what it sounded like, they hadn't gotten anywhere. Shame.

"Do you think they're stronger than you?"

"It's possible." There was no hint of concern or irritation in her voice. "Of course it's possible. While Onii-san is a very good dancer, as am I, we're small in the scope of the universe. Tiny, in fact."

"Yeah, that's what I thought, too," he confessed without hesitation. He didn't think she was the type to get offended.

"Are you worried?"

There was no sense of judgment, but Takeshi smiled and shook his head anyway. "Nah, not worried. Just..."

That fight between Hibari and Masami last week had haunted him. He couldn't exactly explain it, even to himself, but watching that fight had been...exhilarating. Breathtaking in a way Takeshi normally only associated with a hard, hard baseball game, when he was at bat and they were two points away from winning and his teammate was at third base. Maybe it was the speed and grace of their movements, maybe it was the danger, maybe it was the simple...perfection of their dance.

Takeshi didn't know, but he had been finding his thoughts whirling around the fight like it was a black hole, going over every second, every step and shift, all with a hushed sort of reverence.

And it hadn't taken long at all for a want to build up behind the awe.

"...say. if I wanted to be stronger, what do you think I should do?" Takeshi tilted his head back and grinned at the sky, clear and pristine blue, shielded with a veil of yellow that signified the sun's readiness to toss in the towel for the day.

"Hmm." To his slight relief, Masami didn't seem impatient at the long pause or surprised by his inquiry at all, but then, that was just like her. Instead, the quirk of her mouth was thoughtful, and she traced elegant fingers over the leaf's veins. "I presume Reborn-san or Gokudera-san has already informed you of your tendency to favor your arms?"

"Yeah. I've been working on it." It wasn't easy, not when his arms were so essential for playing baseball, but this was a game, too, and he intended to win it. Besides. Tsuna was definitely worth it.

She was silent for another long, peaceful heartbeat. "I would advise you to find a suitable weapon."

He was almost surprised. "A weapon, huh?"

"You're very familiar with the bat, but in terms of endurance and lethality, it's a bit lacking." As if to demonstrate, Masami whipped out her fan from somewhere on her person and began to fan herself, dark strands of hair flying in the gentle breeze. "Would you like to know some options?"

"Nah, it's okay. I already have something in mind." Takeshi wondered what his father would say when he asked about the family sword style. Before he'd met Tsuna, he had never shown any interest in it, after all.

"Well?" Hayato demanded, hands on his hips.

Masami glanced up from her laptop and stared at him unblinkingly. She didn't say a word.

He scowled and plopped himself in the seat across from her, crossing his arms. Figures he would find her in the library on a Sunday afternoon, right as the creeping rays of the sunset were sweeping over the bookshelves. "Do we have anything?" Hayato demanded impatiently. "Don't tell me you forgot to look at the results."

Even as he said it, he was well-aware that the possibility was so low as to be near zero. Witch she might be but Masami was nothing but meticulous.

She sighed near soundlessly. "Eighty-one percent were prefects. Sixty-six percent were male. Fifty-seven percent were in the outermost parts of town. Less than one percent were attacked within a thirty meter radius of school. Eighty-five percent third-years, nine percent second-years, and six percent first-years."

His frown only darkened. "None of that is a clear correlation, maiko witch."

"No." Masami tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "There have been twenty-one injured, which means there will be eleven more victims. I assume that Sawada-san will be targeted as either number one or after they have gone through the whole set."

Hayato gritted his teeth, fingers curling into fists. Like hell he was going to let anyone lay on a finger on his Boss! "Damn it, find something!" he snapped. "Something, anything!" Shoving away from the table, he wrenched himself out of the seat and began to pace, too restless on adrenaline and worry to sit still.

Silence from the witch, broken soon by the sound of typing. He glanced back at her warily, having suffered through enough fan-related injuries to know that quiet on Masami's part was just as dangerous as shouting and threats and gunfire from other, saner, people, but strangely enough, all she really was doing was working on her laptop.

Even if, well, her pointed focus on the screen, lack of communication, and mild frown were rather icy in nature.

Gokudera Hayato didn't do guilt. He just didn't.

Huffing out a long breath, he ran a hand through his hair and threw himself back in the chair. "What can we do?" he asked, and if his voice was softer than before, it was just because yelling in a library wasn't on the list of unspoken rules that he would gleefully break into a thousand pieces whenever given the chance.

Masami flicked him a cool glance over the top of the laptop. "That would depend on your definition of 'do', Gokudera-san." Her voice was even and polite and colder than the Arctic.

He suppressed a wince. Yeah, okay, maybe he deserved that, but — "Shut up. You know what I mean."

She blinked at him for a long moment before those gray eyes began to scan her laptop screen, quick and intelligent. "Thirty-three percent trained in martial arts after school. Twenty-three percent were in the Kendo Club. Nine percent were in the Boxing Club. Four percent practiced parkour."

Masami tilted her head, gaze back on him, so intense it was almost enough to make him flinch backward. "If you'd like to 'do' something, then please grow stronger, Gokudera-san, preferably both mentally and physically. The storm, so to speak, will hit at any moment now."

And she smiled, sweet and lovely.

He leaned back despite himself.

"Masami-san?" Tsuna was skipping class for the first time in a long time. He couldn't bring himself to care about the scolding Reborn was inevitably going to heap upon him, not when he was resting on a comfortable couch, cuddled up with a warm blanket, and holding a cup of hot chocolate in his hands.

Masami momentarily shifted her attention from the paperwork on her desk to him. "Sawada-san." It was the second time she'd directly acknowledged him since waving him inside her office and quietly telling Kusakabe to provide Tsuna with what he needed.

Tsuna didn't know how Kusakabe knew exactly what he wanted but found himself really enjoying his hot chocolate. To be honest, he'd expected Masami to tell him to go to class instead of loitering around her office, but she hadn't done anything but give him a swift once-over when he'd first knocked on her door.

Then again, even with all of these incidents, he'd noticed that she was much more relaxed after her short vacation than before. He wondered how long she had needed that, how long she had forced herself to stay. And speaking of the attacks...

"They're after me, aren't they?"

The scritch-scratch of her pen ceased, leaving the silence to ring in her office. Masami was motionless for three painful heartbeats before she placed the pen down carefully and steepled her fingers together, bringing them up beneath her chin. Her scrutiny was disconcerting, even with all these years between them. "...yes," she said at last, and this, this was why Tsuna had come to Masami.

He knew Reborn would smirk knowingly and drawl out some puzzle he couldn't solve, Gokudera would stutter and reassure him that it was fine, nothing was wrong, no one was going to touch Tsuna, and Yamamoto would laugh and smile and say something about how it was all a game. Not Masami. Like Hibari, only less scary but still plenty scary enough, she rarely offered him anything other than the truth when she decided that he deserved it. Sure, sometimes, she might coat it with politeness and honey and subtle twists he couldn't follow, but the important stuff, the truly important stuff — Masami didn't mess around with those.

"Do we know who they are?" Tsuna whispered, feeling like he was tainting the very air he breathed. He felt very cold all of a sudden and wrapped the blanket tighter around himself.

"I'm afraid not." Try as he might, he could find nothing but calm neutrality in her tone, in her eyes.

He was definitely shivering now and took a sip of hot chocolate to combat the chills in his bones. He thought...Namimori wasn't, had never been, safe, not before, when bullies could find him no matter where he ran, including inside his house, not with the yakuza and gleaming tonfa, and not after, when gun-totting hitman children came and explosions and dynamite were daily events, but this wasn't —

This wasn't the same. This was something outside, where Reborn was a blank slate, where Hibari was incensed and Masami was working on paperwork instead of dancing with the enemy, and Tsuna was frightened. Helplessly terrified, because he knew, he just knew, that people were expecting him to fix this, and he didn't know if he could.

"What do I do?" he asked, voice soft and shaky.

She didn't reprimand him. "You know what to do."

"I do?" Tsuna didn't think he did. He wanted to hide under this blanket and drink his hot chocolate and maybe never leave. It was warm here, safe, and he hadn't realized how much he'd needed some sort of stability in the chaos of his life, some sort of safe zone. He was fourteen; how, why was this his life?

Masami hummed and picked up her pen again. "You do. Hold your head high, keep your back straight, speak politely, be confident, trust in your instincts, and be composed at all times. The dance will come naturally when the music sounds."

For a good ten seconds, he wasn't sure if this wasn't what she had been preparing him for all along, no matter how ludicrous it sounded.

"How," Masami inquired, placing her cup on the table, "does the Mafia view women?"

Bianchi smiled, wry, and leaned back in her chair, crossing her legs. She wore a simple black t-shirt and jeans, casual and beautiful as always. Masami wondered if she saved the elaborate dresses and make-up for when she truly wanted to distract and beguile. "It varies. In most cases, not as well as you might think. Generally, a mafiosa is merely a physical reflection of her husband. A trophy wife for some, a means to a productive alliance for others, or just a way to demonstrate power through beauty and youth."

"The mafioso with the youngest, prettiest wife holds the most power?" That sounded like a waste. Of what, Masami couldn't say, but a waste nonetheless. Of a life, perhaps.

Bianchi shrugged. "It's just another measure of strength and virility. Posturing. Some of the more intelligent trophy wives run their husband's households and order the servants around, but men rule the Mafia and that's not likely to change. However."

Masami sipped her tea and waited.

Bianchi's smile was blade sharp and as sweetly poisonous as the food she could create with nothing more than intent and will. "There has been a rise in female leadership in the past few decades. I dare say your boy is going to be dealing with some female Bosses during his reign."

She didn't bother reminding Bianchi that Tsunayoshi wasn't hers...at least, not solely hers. "And you?"

Long, perfectly manicured fingers tapped idly on the table, familiar green eyes set upon her with a perceptiveness that could have been frightening. "Me," Bianchi mused, almost mockingly. "I was born an heiress, did you know? Raised to be the perfect young lady, the perfect wife."

Masami blinked slowly and didn't say that she had never once considered getting married, to giving someone else that much power over her.

Bianchi waved a hand dismissively. "That particular plan of my parents didn't work, of course, not when it became clear what I could do." She smiled, and her tea began to bubble and turn purple. "Nice girls can't poison their husbands at the breakfast table, but hitmen can."

Masami spared a second to mourn her tea, which was now an obnoxious green, before casually dumping it out on the ground and sparring no concern for the grooves it began to make on the pavement. It had been a good idea to eat outside of the cafe, after all. "So," she said, "there are two paths for mafiosa. To stay at home or to go out and kill."

Bianchi tilted her head, considering. "Yes. That's about the gist of it."

Masami nodded and rose to her feet, curtsying without thinking much of it. "Thank you for your assistance, Bianchi-san. Please excuse me." She left off all the other meaningless courtesies she would have given were it anyone else; there was a special understanding here between the two of them.

But as she turned away for home, Bianchi said, "Masami."

Masami paused and glanced back. Bianchi's eyes burned, her red lips twisted into a smirk that was all power and confidence and danger. "Don't forget: the men own the organization but the organization owns the women. Don't let them own you."

She only smiled fearlessly. "They won't," and it was a practically a promise.

"What is it today?" Kyoya sounded sulky, and he hadn't even tasted anything yet.

She swallowed back a yawn without much facial movement and frowned slightly at the hours of sleep she'd been getting recently. At night, the doubts and guilt came for her like a pack of hyenas pouncing upon weakness, whispers of you should have stayed and if you'd trained them properly, truly trained them, this wouldn't have happened. "I'm not done yet, Onii-san."

He scoffed but didn't say anything more, instead flipping through the reports of the most recent victims: two karate-practicing third-years, one male and one female.

Masami sprinkled the last vestiges of the Parmesan cheese over the mixture of butter, flour, milk, spices, and more cheese, before dumping the pasta inside the sauce and stirring. "Why does everyone think I have all the answers?" she asked out of the blue.

Kyoya snorted without missing a beat. "They're herbivores."

"Sawada-san's an omnivore according to you."

"He's also a small animal being pursued by carnivores." He closed the files and pushed them away in disgust. "The baseball herbivore has potential, but the other one is too hot-headed. He'll get himself killed if he's not careful."

She hummed noncommittally and poured the pasta into two bowls, bringing them over to the chabudai. "Nine more to go."

"Find them," Kyoya said, and it was almost an order, might have been one if not for the exhaustion that kept them both up at night.

Masami sighed for the nth time that week. Being a carnivore and fending for your Territory was all good and well until you realized the fate of a town rested on your shoulders. This is your fault, that insidious, foul-scented hyena that lived inside her subconscious growled. "Please eat your pasta, Onii-san."

The attacks came very quickly after that short lull, the eye of the storm passing with devastating speed. Five victims near the school, closer than ever before, a particular Captain of the Boxing Club among them.

Sasagawa Ryohei was in the hospital with seven of his teeth missing, Tsunayoshi was distraught, Kyoko was upset, Hayato was handling dynamite, Takeshi was smiling an assassin's smile, and Kyoya was ready to hunt down the interlopers and bite them to death.

(The almost-friendship that flickered between Ryohei and Kyoya was one Masami had never questioned or intruded on. That didn't mean she wasn't aware of its existence.)

"They're Kokuyo Middle," he said curtly, stalking out in brisk, dangerous steps. "He saw two. Blond, scar over his nose, and black hair, white beanie. Stay here and guard, little sister."

She didn't argue, aware that someone had to watch over things while he was away. In the same vein, she also couldn't deny the unease bubbling up beneath the pragmatism, the venomous concern that drove her to match his steps for longer than necessary. This was, in many ways, no different than going off to deal with some unruly yakuza or troublesome delinquents. True, it was most likely Mafia, but Hayato was Mafia, and he wasn't a sincere challenge to either of the Hibari Siblings. Yet...still, she was on edge, agitated behind her usual poise.

Masami wanted to say something, offer to leave Tetsuya in charge, go with him herself, or even just push a few of the remaining prefects to go with him. Really, sending along even Hayato or Takeshi would have been a relief at this rate. But they were who they were, and that meant they didn't interfere in each other's business.

And, for all that she had the prior claim on Tsunayoshi, this was very much Kyoya's business.

For the first time in years, Masami regretted their rules, a slow burn against her heart. Quelling her anxiety, she could only smile and bow, stopping at the gate. "Good hunting, Onii-san."

Kyoya grunted in response and was off, gakuran jacket flapping out behind him.

She stared after him for a rather inappropriate amount of time before turning on her heel and walking back into the hospital.

Takeshi was smiling. His fingers flexed, looking for a baseball bat or a katana. It was almost surprising, really, how quickly he had grown accustomed to the sword after only a few days of basic katas. His dad said that he wasn't ready for more, and although Takeshi thought different, he knew that his dad had made up his mind and would keep to it.

They were pretty alike when it came to stubbornness.

Tsuna was inside, talking to Senpai. Gokudera leaned against the wall next to Takeshi, smoking a cigarette despite the sign that proclaimed smoking was prohibited inside the hospital, the line of his shoulders tense and mouth set in a ferocious scowl. It was rather obvious that he was blaming himself for this, and Takeshi knew why.

It had been too close this time. They, whoever 'they' were, had come too close. Before it was just prefects, and yeah, that was creepy and scary, but this was Senpai, who they knew, who had helped them with the Pole-Knocking and who Tsuna had boxed with, and he had been attacked and got hurt and had his teeth pulled out.

As a message. For Tsuna.

Takeshi was smiling because that was what he knew how to do, and he thought that Tsuna didn't need any more pressure and Gokudera didn't need any more variables to handle. In the dark spaces of his mind, past the cheerfulness and the calm, he thought about Senpai's attackers and what they were planning to do to Tsuna.

He didn't know where the little guy was. These guys were much too close to Tsuna, now, and if they weren't able to protect him. Well. They needed to be able to protect Tsuna. Takeshi needed to be able to protect Tsuna.

The steps, when they came, were nearly silent but heeled boots tended to be conspicuous, and Takeshi wasn't surprised when Masami appeared in the doorway and walked up to them. He was surprised, however, when he realized that Masami's posture was almost as stiff as Gokudera's, although she was much more subtle about it. Her fan hid most of her face but there were lines in the corner of her eyes, and her movements were too sharp, not as fluid as normal.

"What do you want, maiko witch?" Gokudera asked, voice as brutally sharp as the edge of a blade. Takeshi didn't miss the fact that he was dropping the cigarette and stomping it out with his shoe though. Was it a sorta trained reflex or did he actually care for what she wanted? Takeshi had never been able to decide between the two.

Maybe it was a little bit of both. It was hard to tell with Gokudera. Masami was even better at hiding everything, much like Takeshi himself, so it was more than a little odd that she was so transparent at the moment. At least he knew that Gokudera tended to lash out when he was angry, even when he was just angry at himself.

Masami's eyes flickered to the door. It was slightly open, the small crack revealing nothing. She stopped two meters in front of them and stayed silent for just a second too long. "Sawada-san?"

"He's in there with Senpai." Takeshi kept his tone nice and easy. Now, he suspected, was not the time to challenge Masami, even though he didn't know why yet. "What's up?"

Masami didn't say anything.

"Look, if you don't have anything important to tell us, just fuck off." Gokudera picked up his cigarette and threw it into the nearby trash can, creating a beautiful pitch-worthy curve. His words weren't nearly as pretty. "Juudaime doesn't need to put up with your abuse right now."

Takeshi resisted the urge to wince. Frustration and protectiveness all but radiated from his classmate but, well, that was kind of harsh. He knew that Masami could be harsh, too, but Tsuna never complained, sometimes even seemed to take courage from her strength. Takeshi had never claimed he understood their relationship, but he respected it.

Sure enough, Masami's eyes narrowed minutely, and she went statue-still, but she didn't retaliate in words or actions. Her voice, when it came, was soft and chilly. "We know the identity of the attackers."

Gokudera snapped to attention. At his side, his fingers clenched into fists. When he opened his mouth, Takeshi knew that Gokudera's words were going to be lined with razors, so he cut in first with a smile. "That's good, right? Now we know who we're playing the game against."

"Indeed." Her gaze was too direct, too frigid, too unblinking. "Kokuyo Middle, at least two."

"Well then, why aren't we going after them!?" Gokudera spit out, incensed.

"Onii-san already has."

Oh, Takeshi thought. That was the problem, wasn't it? Normally, Masami could weather everything Gokudera threw at her with nothing more than a polite smile and diplomatic words and the occasional smack of her fan. Today, her fan had yet to leave its position against her jaw, and there was something brittle in her silence.

He didn't understand the relationship between Masami and Hibari either, but he knew familial love when he saw it, no matter how strange and unconventional it was. Hibari was strong, but he was her brother, so it was more than possible that Masami was just worried for her brother, and that was why she was off-balance.

Not that Gokudera seemed to care about that. He crossed his arms, leaning forward aggressively. If anything, he only looked angrier, and that wasn't good.

It made Takeshi uneasy. Takeshi knew all about the importance of teamwork, and now was the worst possible time for them to start fighting amongst each other, not that he could really blame either of them. Gokudera's number one priority was Tsuna, and Masami was probably worried about her brother and her prefects and her town.

It was weird, because Gokudera had Bianchi, and shouldn't he know about being concerned for a sibling? Apparently not because he accused, "What, you just left it all to him!? What if he fails? Juudaime's safety is on the line here, and you're just going to lounge around!?"

"Hey, hey, I'm sure Masami's doing the best she can," Takeshi said, holding onto his smile with more effort than usual. "Besides, someone has to watch over Namimori, right? Everything'll be fine."

As could only be expected, Gokudera whirled on him. "Shut up, baseball idiot! This isn't some stupid game, there's no happy ending guaranteed! We shouldn't be standing around doing nothing! What if that bastard doesn't win, huh? What then!? I'll tell you what, Juudaime's going to become the target, and the Mafia isn't known for mercy!"

If Masami wasn't still standing upright and not unconscious on the floor, Takeshi wouldn't have known she was still breathing; she was utterly motionless. There was something very dangerous in her lack of response, both verbally and physically, and he was reminded of a viper poised to strike.

He wondered if Gokudera recognized that he had essentially told her that it was likely that Hibari would die if he didn't win. He wondered if Gokudera even cared at this point.

It was probably best for everyone that Tsuna walked out right with a frown on his face and his brow furrowed but perfectly safe and sound. It took him about five seconds to notice the tension thrumming in the air and freeze, assessing the situation at a glance. Takeshi had the feeling that Masami had taught him how to do that. Tsuna's frown deepened, his previously thoughtful expression turning to abject concern. He shifted his weight, coming to a stop an equal distance away from all of them after shutting the door.

Takeshi tried to look at things from Tsuna's point of view. Gokudera's body language was blatantly hostile, Masami was a thousand kilometers away and way too on-guard to the observant eye, and Takeshi was pulling on years of experience to keep himself neutral and relaxed.

Yeah, Tsuna was probably right to be perturbed.

"Guys?" he prompted hesitantly. "What's wrong?"

Masami spun on her heel and glided out of the hallway.

"Kyo-san's not back yet," Tetsuya said to Masami four hours later, voice carefully modulated and bland.

She paused, the pencil in her hand snapping neatly into two. There were stacks of paperwork on her desk. The laptop pushed to the very edge of the desk displayed a map of Kokuyo Land on one half of the screen and the details of the victims on the other. Masami set the pencil parts down with uncalled for gentleness. "Yes," she said softly. "I know."

Tetsuya hesitated. "Will you be going after him?"

She stared, unseeing, at the form in front of her. "He wouldn't want me to."

"...Kyo-san isn't invincible." The words themselves were almost a form of betrayal, an expression of lack of faith, if not for the fact that it was Tetsuya who said them.

"Yes," she said. "I know."

In retrospect, she shouldn't have let him out of her sight.

Of course, at the time, Masami was juggling the remains of the prefects—the ones too weak to make it onto the countdown list — the authorities, the worried citizens who wanted her reassurance, the school administration, and the condition of the victims. She was keeping a sharp eye on Tsunayoshi, Hayato, and Takeshi, surely the next few targets. She was running herself ragged trying to maintain some semblance of order in Namimori.

It was Tetsuya. Steady, dependable Tetsuya. He didn't fight, although he was quite capable of it. Tetsuya overlooked the fight, cleaned up the aftermath, and was Kyoya's right hand. She hadn't been thinking.

She hadn't been thinking.

In retrospect, she should never have let him out of her sight.

Tsuna said, "Don't," and Reborn blinked at him.

"We need to check his teeth, Dame-Tsuna." Reborn didn't let go of Kusakabe's jaw.

"No, we don't." Tsuna was proud when his voice didn't even waver. He wasn't friends with Kusakabe, not really, but he really did respect the other student, both for dealing with the Hibari Siblings on a daily basis and for the rare kindness that Kusakabe had shown him. Kusakabe didn't deserve this indignity on top of everything else. "It's going to be six, right, Gokudera-kun?"

Gokudera teleported across the room as if by magic to appear by Tsuna's side. "Right." He was chewing on a cigarette but it wasn't lit. Tsuna still hadn't gotten a satisfying explanation for what had been going on between Gokudera, Yamamoto, and Masami earlier either.

"I guess this means Hibari ran into trouble." Yamamoto's smile was absent as he walked up to them, hands in his pockets. "Hey, you," he said to one of the lingering prefects panicking silently in the corner, "does Masami know about this?"

The prefect jerked his head up, eyes wide as saucers. "H-Hai!" His distraught face conveyed very clearly that whatever her reaction had been, it had terrified the life out of him. Tsuna was quite familiar with that look, as he had seen it often, sometimes in his own mirror.

"Here, take a look at this." Reborn handed Tsuna a paper, Gokudera and Yamamoto crowding around him to look at it over his shoulders.

"Namimori Middle's fighting strength ranking?" Tsuna read aloud.

Gokudera, however, hissed sharply while Tsuna was still processing the information. "This is it! This is what they're basing their attacks on! Look, Juudaime, the order of victims matches the ranking list exactly! Damn it, if we'd had this list earlier...!"

"Gokudera’s next," Yamamoto noted with a curious lilt to his voice. Tsuna froze up. Oh Kami-sama, no. "And then it's me, Tsuna, Masami, and Hibari." For one long second, the world ground to a stop. Tsuna's eyes were widening with the first strains of complete and utter panic when Reborn neatly cut him off.

"Dame-Tsuna." Reborn's gaze was unyielding, hard. "This is Fuuta's ranking list. We've taught you about the Omertà already, so you should know that there's no way an ordinary person would have access to this list. What are you going to do?"

Tsuna stared at the list and suppressed the urge to scream. This had been what he was afraid of! He didn't know what to do; why was he in charge of these decisions!? He had never even wanted to enter the Mafia, much less become the Vongola Decimo or whatever! This was why he hadn't wanted his friends to get involved either!

"Tch, this is nothing! Don't you worry, Juudaime, we'll get these freaks!" Gokudera grinned reassuringly, absently throwing a stick of dynamite from one hand to the next. "They're not going to lay a single finger on you!"

"Yeah, what he said!" Yamamoto laughed, propping an elbow on Tsuna's shoulder. "This inter-school mafia role-play will be great!"

Tsuna sweatdropped at his friends' eternal optimism. Even if they truly thought everything would go fine — Gokudera was rash, and Yamamoto was naive, so could he trust their judgment of the matter? — he wasn't at all sure what he was supposed to do. Reborn expected him to be a leader but Tsuna didn't know how to do that, not really.

"Hold your head high, keep your back straight, speak politely, be confident, trust in your instincts, and be composed at all times. The dance will come naturally when the music sounds."

Masami's voice echoed in his ears, and before he even knew what he was doing, Tsuna was taking a deep breath and adjusting his posture, forcing his panicked thoughts to settle somewhat. As soon as he calmed down, he realized what the problem was. "Wait..." he said slowly, fixing his eyes back on the list, "if Hibari-san is out of commission, and Gokudera-kun and Yamamoto are here...then the only one left on the list is Masami-san!" The thought made the blood in his veins run cold.

For so long, Tsuna had been under the impression that Masami was mostly invulnerable, and Hibari was on another plane of existence entirely, but if these guys had managed to get Hibari, and Hibari was stronger than Masami...his oldest friend was still only human, too.

Gokudera scowled and spun around, stalking straight up to the previous prefect and grabbing him by his collar. "Where is she!?" he demanded, shaking the poor guy back and forth. "Tell me!"

The prefect squeaked. And told them.

When they burst through the doors, Tsuna was near frantic with panic and Masami was sitting calmly at her desk, legs crossed, hands in lap, barely batting an eyelid at their loud, dramatic entrance. "Greetings." She didn't rise out of her seat to bow.

"Masami-san! Are you alright!?" Tsuna gasped out before his mouth caught up to his brain, and his eyes notified him that Masami looked like she had just been in a meeting with Important People, not so much as a strand of black hair out of place.

"I'm fine," she said mildly.

"Shut up, maiko witch," Gokudera mumbled, hands braced on his knees as he tried to get his breath back. "Be grateful that Juudaime was so worried about you! We had to run all the way here from the damn hospital!"

"I appreciate the effort."

"Well, I'm glad that we were able to catch you before they did!" Yamamoto straightened up with a laugh, the least winded out of all of them. "You're the second person on the list, by the way."

One eyebrow was gradually arched. "List?"

Tsuna held the paper out. Masami took it, scanned the names, and glanced at Gokudera. "May I borrow your lighter?"

Gokudera frowned, brow furrowing in confusion. The antagonistic air from before seemed to be gone, though, because he only hesitated for a second more before digging in his pockets and tossing her the silver lighter he used for his cigarettes.

Masami smiled very politely and promptly lit the paper on fire.

"Hieeee," Tsuna whimpered.

Masami casually kept her eyes on the steadily burning paper and remained motionless until the flames were creeping up towards the corner she was holding the scrap from. Before Tsuna could start to panic over her accidentally — or not so accidentally — burning herself, Masami straightened her arm and tilted her head.

Reborn appeared out of nowhere in a firefighter's costume and doused the paper with a fire extinguisher.

"Hieeeeee!" Tsuna yelped.

Masami laced her fingers together and rested her chin on the bridge created. She was looking at Reborn. "Rokudo Mukuro."

Gokudera stiffened, his eyes going wide. "Fuuuuuuuuck."

"Gokudera?" Yamamoto glanced between Gokudera, Masami, and Reborn curiously,

Reborn tilted the brim of his fedora down, shadows obscuring his eyes. "How do you know that name?"

"You're not answering my question, Reborn-san." Her smile never reached her eyes, cold, cutting steel gray. Tsuna shivered, the icy feeling that trickled down his spine not unlike the oppressive doom that had enveloped him when Hibari had stormed in weeks before, furious and murderous.

But...if Masami thought this was important...then it must be. "Reborn? What is Masami-san talking about?"

"...Two weeks ago, there was a jailbreak at a high security prison reserved only for the most terrible of mafia criminals who have committed the most heinous of crimes. The escaped criminals killed several of the wardens and other criminals. After that, the mafia's information network tracked down the ringleaders behind the jailbreak."

"No one said he was coming to Japan!" Gokudera began to pace, strung out and agitated.

Reborn nodded. "The mastermind was Rokudo, but he had two subordinates. Following that, three students returned from abroad transferred into Kokuyo Middle. Not long after, a gang of hooligans was formed. That was ten days ago. And guess who the gang leader happens to be?"

"This Rokudo guy, huh." Yamamoto rubbed the back of his neck, smiling. "He's the final boss of this particular game, right? We get him and everything goes back to normal."

Normal. Tsuna hadn't realized until now just how halcyon 'normal' had been, playing video games with Reborn and Lambo, having to deal with Bianchi teaching Haru and Kyoko poison cooking, crying over homework with Yamamoto and being tutored by Gokudera, being bitten to death by Hibari, and talking with Masami.

"Normal," Tsuna whispered. "I want normal again."

Gokudera set his jaw and smiled at Tsuna. "Then that's what we'll get for you, Juudaime! You can definitely count on your Right-Hand Man!"

"I won't be taking part in this fight, and you'll only have one Dying Will Bullet," Reborn informed him cheerfully. "So you'll have to try your best."

"Hahaha, we can do that!" Yamamoto put his hands in his pockets and rocked back on his heels.

Masami didn't say a word but rose to her feet, regal as a queen. "Gather your weapons, a first-aid kit, and some food and water. We'll meet at Sawada-san's house in one hour." With that, she swept out the door, parting them like Moses and the Red Sea.

(But, of course, it couldn't be nearly that easy.)

Masami was...composed, controlled. There was no fire threatening to break free from her control, no reckless, destructive fury raging within her. She was not going to go charging after Onii-san like a thoughtless fool and ruin whatever chance she still had at containing this madness.

No. She knew tactics; she knew battle strategy. This was a trap. A spider's web that had closed in around Kyoya, a taunt, a lure. Now was not the time to be blinded by emotion. There was ice water in her bloodstream, not lava. Her mind was diamond-sharp, not clouded.

These intruders were not going to win, not even if she had to track them all down by herself and slit their throats.

(Perhaps, her mother had known her better than she had known herself. Perhaps, this was truly inevitable, as Reborn seemed to think.)

Masami stepped off the school grounds and smiled politely at the thin, lanky student in a white beanie and green Kokuyo Middle uniform. The description happened to be rather familiar. "Greetings," she said, bowing shallowly, never taking her eyes off of him.

"Namimori Middle School, class 2-A, seat number 10, Hibari Masami," he drawled, nudging up his glasses. "Number two, which is out of order, but Yamamoto Takeshi isn't available at the moment. Let's get this over quickly. I don't like to sweat."

"...noted." She snapped open her tessen and pressed the silk to her lips. "And you are...?"

"Kokuyo Middle, second year, Kakimoto Chikusa. I came here to break you." Blunt, blunt words. She was neither impressed nor frightened.

"So it appears. Would you mind if we moved this elsewhere." It wasn't a question. She had convinced the Principal that school should be canceled for the day, but while most of the students had had the sense to stay at home, there were still herbivores out and about. If they started fighting here and now, they would attract attention. At the moment, Masami couldn't care less if her pristine reputation was blown to high hell, but Namimori didn't need any more destruction and despair after these past weeks. The civilians were not to be injured or traumatized.

And when she got finished this particular dance, there would be blood staining the ground. The question was simply whose.

"I don't care," he said, impassive. "This is not meant to be a show."

Masami didn't bother with a reply but angled her body to the right and began to lead the way to an abandoned field hidden behind the bulk of the school. Chikusa followed without a word, hands in his pockets. Curious, frightened eyes turned to watch them, but she smiled, reassuring, angelic, and no one made a move to intervene.

Neither of them turned their backs on the other until they arrived at the circular clearing, where they faced one another with five meters of distance between them.

"Would you like to lead this dance?" Masami invited, weight on the balls of her feet, form relaxed and ready, smile affable, and fan at her side.

Chikusa blinked but was otherwise unperturbed. "Fine."

The world slowed down a bit.

His right hand withdrew from his pocket, his arm swung out, and her eyes tracked the movement instinctively. He was holding something — a weapon, most likely — and she was jumping, flipping forward in mid-air. A second later, a barrage of needles hit the patch of dirt she had been standing on, and a yo-yo was swinging back towards her, string glinting in the sunlight.

Interesting.

The world sped up a bit.

Masami knocked the yo-yo away with her fan, careful to remain out of the trajectory of the needle releases. She was on the downward curve of her fall, and there was another yo-yo arching through the air, heading towards her collarbone. She flicked her wrist and let her gunsen slip into her hand, deflecting the projectile easily. Landing lightly on both feet, a cloud of dirt slamming up around her, Masami pushed off without halting her momentum, sprinting forward.

Chikusa's right hand pulled straight back, his left hand swinging around, and she knew that those yo-yos were heading towards her unprotected back.

She smiled.

Planting her right foot firmly on the ground, Masami went low and pivoted, the yo-yos flying above her even as needles flew out, one catching her along the side of her neck. Warm blood trickled down her skin, but she paid the wound no mind. He hissed out a breath as he realized his weapons were now heading for him and twisted his wrists to roll up the yo-yos, the disks smacking into his palms. Completing the three hundred and eighty degree turn, she rose to her feet and slashed up with her fans at the same time, not holding back.

Chikusa was fast enough to avoid the tessen but the gunsen caught him along the chest, a beautiful sideways cut that went from his hip to his shoulder, blood flashing through the air. It wasn't a particularly deep cut, but it wasn't shallow either, and she didn't hesitate to slam her closed tessen into his throat while he cried out.

These people had lost all rights to her mercy when they first attacked a Namimori student, much less her brother.

He staggered back a step and leaped back before she could attack again. A flick of his wrists sent the yo-yos singing through the air once more, but it was a simple matter to predict their trajectory and avoid and deflect. The needles were a bit more bothersome, however, and one brushed against her knee while another sliced into her abdomen.

It didn't slow her down in the least.

And, more to the point, while Masami had quickly caught onto the steps of his dance, Chikusa had not had nearly enough time to learn hers.

It took her less than three more minutes to pick out the gaps in his defenses, and she wasn't merciful in exploiting them. When Chikusa sprang back once more, he was bleeding from shallow and deep cuts in various places, vivid bruises already blooming on his skin, visible where his uniform had been torn to shreds.

Gasping, he stared at her as she straightened up and went predatory still, in much better condition. His eyes were wilder than before and grudgingly respectful. "You're strong, you have to know. Who are the members of your Family, and who's your Boss?"

So, she thought clinically, they were after Tsunayoshi after all. It was strike three, should she have needed it. "I acknowledge no one as my superior. And I hold no loyalty to the Mafia. But I'll tell you if you answer a question of mine."

Chikusa looked at her, assessing. "...troublesome. All right."

"Hibari Kyoya. How was he defeated?" Masami's voice was very, very soft.

Understanding flickered across his face. "Sakura."

She smiled, and it was a smile not a single member of Namimori Middle had ever seen, with the exception of Kyoya, dark and knowing and very not-nice. His eyes went wide. "Sawada Tsunayoshi," Masami said, every syllable precisely pronounced, and moved, her original and secondary objective complete.

Her tessen smashed into the back of Chikusa's head before he could even realize she had been holding a fraction of her speed back for the entire dance, and he collapsed at her feet, unconscious. Masami watched it happen without flinching and inhaled deeply when there was no more movement to be seen, putting her fans away once more.

Almost absently, she reached down and picked up one of the needles lying on the ground. Holding it in front of the sun's glare, Masami pursed her lips, a hint annoyed.

Of all people, why did it have to be him?

("Shamal-san? I need a favor.")

Tsuna arrived at the scheduled meeting place with Gokudera and Yamamoto by his side, a hooded Bianchi tagging along, and a much too cheerful Reborn leading the way. The road seemed to stretch out before him, the lingering sense of dread that he hadn't managed to extinguish twisting his gut into knots.

What deity did he offend, what sin did he commit? Not only was he going to die, he was going to bring everyone down with him!

He hated this situation, hated that people were being attacked, being hurt, being hospitalized because he was supposed to be the so-called Vongola Decimo — and this was his life that this Vongola Nono was arranging for him; didn't he get a choice in the matter? — but he knew that he couldn't be a selfish coward any longer.

Not with Onii-san in the hospital. Not with Fuuta as a hostage. Not with Hibari-san missing and Masami upset. Not with Gokudera and Yamamoto on that list.

Tsuna grasped his resolve in a bloodless grip and tried not to shake uncontrollably. Even after everything, he was still scared to death, scared of death, but he thought that that was okay, even understandable, no matter what Reborn might insist. Masami might have pushed him to face his fears, but she had never insisted his feelings were invalid.

"Fear is sensible," she had said when he'd asked, almost philosophical in one of her rare open, thoughtful moods. Fear keeps us aware. Fear wakes us up before death can shut us down. There is no shame in being afraid so long as that fear does not control you. Sometimes, it's best to run. Sometimes, it's time to fight."

Of course, Masami expected him to fight 95% of the time before Reborn came into his life and at least 75% of the time after, but her words were comforting all the same.

And speaking of Masami, she was waiting for them up ahead. Thankfully, the tension in the hospital and the hint of violence in her office Tsuna had sensed had disappeared. It was more than likely that she had regained the vicious chokehold she held over her emotions and her outward image instead of actually calming down, but he was relieved regardless.

At least until a quiet voice in the back of his mind urged him to pay attention, and he came close enough to zero onto the small cut on her neck.

"Masami-san!" Tsuna sprinted the last few meters, blanching as worst-case scenarios started to race through his mind. He'd known she was on the list, he'd known these people were dangerous! Reborn had been with Tsuna, Gokudera and Yamamoto had been together; how could he have forgotten Hibari wasn't here to watch Masami?

As it was, even as those thoughts passed through his head, he caught the unimpressed look she aimed at him and skid to a halt in front of her, hands wringing uselessly, wanting to reassure himself but knowing better than to touch her casually. "Masami-san! Are you alright!? What happened!?"

"Whoa!" Yamamoto, who had been right behind him with Gokudera, glanced over Masami quickly, obviously having caught on to the same thing. "Hey, you okay? It doesn't look like you're injured really bad..."

Gokudera was more brusque as usual. "Maiko witch, what the fuck?"

Reborn didn't even have the decency to look surprised. Bianchi's covered face gave no clues either.

Masami let out a small sigh that spoke clearly of how unnecessary their fussing was. Tsuna couldn't quite bring himself to care about her disapproval at the moment. "I'm perfectly fine," she assured. "The dance went very well — nearly no missed steps."

Tsuna blinked and then smiled faintly, the familiar metaphor soothing him more than anything else. Meanwhile, Gokudera's eye twitched, but Yamamoto laughed. "Sounds good," he said, letting his bundle of sushi and tea dangle at his side. "You can tell us the details on our walk. Ready to go?"

"Yes." Masami smiled, slow as molasses and sweet as poison. "Let's be off."

Chapter Text

Indlamu: a traditional Zulu war dance performed by two dancers in warrior's pelts who shadow each other's moves perfectly.

See, the thing was, Takeshi thought that Masami was great.

He really did.

After all, Masami had always let them off pretty easy when she caught them doing things that probably (definitely) weren't okay and might not be legal, kept Tsuna confident and stable and Gokudera grounded in reality, and was really good at the Mafia game, even though she didn't want to be in it, wasn't on their team, not exactly.

So, Hibari Masami was sort of awesome. And that was why Takeshi, hands tucked behind his head, easy smile on his lips, was carefully, carefully keeping himself between Masami and the others, even as they conversed around him, talking about the enemy player Masami had encountered and beaten without any of them realizing.

(Except maybe the kid, because the kid always seemed to know everything.)

Tsuna was still fussing over Masami, even though it was pretty clear that she was just fine, and Gokudera was grousing and grumbling about how it wasn't all that impressive—  it actually was, in Takeshi's opinion, but that wasn't important at the moment — and Takeshi was fairly certain that neither of them were aware of the peril.

Because Masami was calm and relaxed, movements graceful and fluid, fans nowhere in sight, and certainly the most dangerous in all the time Takeshi had known her.

This wasn't like before, when she had been anxious because Hibari hadn't returned, not even like the frigid, winter fury that had colored her every move, every word, every breath when she'd realized Hibari was in the enemy's hands.

No, the fight with Kakimoto Chikusa had purged all of that from Masami. Leaving behind only a diamond-bright mind, crystal-clear resolve, and dagger-sharp killing intent. And something, something eerily like the impassive mercilessness of an incoming tsunami.

Takeshi didn't think Masami would hurt Tsuna or Gokudera, but he didn't want to take that chance either. In a fight, he didn't doubt that she would wipe the floor with all of them — bar the kid and Bianchi — without breaking a sweat, but he might be able to slow her down a bit.

She knew, too, he thought as she turned to smile serenely at him. She knew exactly what he was doing and was probably even somewhat amused by it in the coldest way possible.

Takeshi inhaled deeply through his nose and kept his smile wide and worry-free. He was worried, yeah, but he was also brimming with restless excitement, like he was stepping up to bat against someone willing to throw the mean fastballs, utilize each and every last dirty, cunning trick, and the world's eye was on him, anticipation in the air.

He supposed he had always loved challenges. The edge of true risk to this one only sent an extra jolt of adrenaline through his veins.

"We're here."

There was, Masami thought, something watching them. Not someone, some thing. She could feel its eyes on her back, a near-rabid, crazed presence with an overabundance of aggression. Tsunayoshi and Hayato, the silly boys, hadn't noticed yet, still looking around the broken-down zoo with wariness.

Takeshi...Takeshi was too busy concentrating on her to notice the additional threat. It was a flaw, one she made a note to inform him of later. A razor-sharp focus was certainly not a bad thing, but tunnel vision was a dangerous thing in the battlefield, and he needed to learn better.

(He wasn't wrong, of course. Oh no, he wasn't wrong. Through the gentle snowstorm frosting over her mind, Masami was well aware that this was not a state of mind she should be in often. It posed too much danger to herself and others.

Maybe she would follow in her mother's footsteps after all.)

Reborn was unconcerned, but then, what could trouble an Arcobaleno? Bianchi was similarly relaxed, but for the poison cooking smoking in her hands, and Masami took her cues from that. Her fans remained out of sight, and it would be for the best that she didn't fight the small prey anyway.

At least not until they found Kyoya and Rokudo Mukuro.

Tsunayoshi touched a finger to the chewed-through bars of the cage they'd discovered, frowning. "It's been chewed clean through. What...?"

There was a shift in the breeze, a sudden concentration of death and blood. Ah. So that was what it was waiting for. Masami was blinking, turning, before Hayato's yelped "Juudaime, be careful! There's something there! Behind us! It's coming!" was out of his mouth.

A large black dog came racing out of the shrubbery, tongue out and growling madly. There was something...off about it, but she was too far away to identify what. It was heading for Takeshi at high speeds, and Masami considered interfering for a long second. Then, she stepped back.

She couldn't coddle them forever.

Takeshi braced his feet and let his bundle of food and tea slip to the ground. Grabbing his bat with both hands, he swung hard, the bat instantly transforming into a sharp metal blade. The dog was sliced clean in half, purple blood splashing onto his face.

Tsunayoshi made a horrified noise.

The corpse dropped to the ground at Takeshi's feet, and his eyes were wide and a tad shocked when they met Masami's. "This thing..." he said, slowly, softly, "...it's already dead."

"A reanimated corpse," she commented, the hair on her nape prickling as her senses picked up further threats. Such a phenomenon was unusual, even for her life. With a twist of her wrist, her tessen slipped into her hand, and Masami snapped it open, holding it in front of her face to hide the tight press of her lips.

"How is that possible?" Tsunayoshi asked, covering his mouth with his hand as if trying to keep himself from vomiting.

"I don't know, but there are more coming!" Takeshi warned, already moving into a combat-ready position. Not half a second later, two more dogs raced out, one aiming for Hayato and the other already leaping at Masami.

She smiled politely at it and flicked her fan in a quick, graceful curve. She was already turning away when the two pieces hit the ground, the blood decorating the grass like dew. Another gentle flick got rid of the lingering blood on the edge of her tessen.

Hayato didn't bother for grace. He threw two sticks of dynamite at his attacker before it was anywhere near him and blew it to kingdom come.

"We're being targeted," Tsunayoshi breathed, sounding equal parts terrified and resolute. "We have to get out of range. Come on, this way!" He ran, heading deeper into Kokuyo Land, and they followed him. The vanguard of the group, Masami frowned. The vibrations coming from her feet were wrong.

She didn't have enough time to think about it before a taunting voice called out from behind them, "I've got you now!" Not only was it the most cliched thing, the requisite dark figure leapt out, silhouetted against the sun, and attempted to slam into her.

Masami was, quite frankly, disgusted. She dodged neatly to the right, and Takeshi, who had been right behind her, jumped backwards with a "woah!"

When he proceeded to fall into the hole created by the impact, she could only sigh. Would it hurt them to be a tad more efficient? She would like to find her brother before sunset if possible.

In hindsight, she was probably lucky that Takeshi managed to dispatch his opponent with only a few nicks and bites for his troubles and Bianchi graciously agreed to take on M.M. Masami definitely didn't have the patience to deal with that girl.

Birds and the Twins, though, that was just going too far. She actually liked Kyoko, Hana, and Haru.

"Quit fucking around!" Hayato snapped, darting forward to yank him forward by the front of his shirt, other hand already in a ready fist. "They have nothing to do with this! If you don't call your hitmen off, I'm going to tear you apart!"

Obviously, no one had properly taught that boy how to threaten someone. As expected, Birds only grinned sickeningly, absolutely unimpressed and unintimidated and most importantly, in control. "Ooops. You better not touch me. Look, your friends...they're going to get it."

On the projected images, the serial killers had moved closer, fingers outstretched menacingly.

Hayato flinched back. "What!?"

...Reborn was too calm. He was ruthless, yes, but he had attempted to keep civilian casualties to a minimum. Besides, these deaths, this position, wasn't one that would benefit Tsunayoshi in a way that would outweigh the potential backslide.

He tilted his chin up at the weight of her gaze and met her eyes inscrutably. She tilted her head to the side a fraction, and he smirked and nodded.

It was enough. She wanted to get going.

"Even if you don't release me, I can give them my orders," said Birds smugly. "The lives of your friends lie within my grasp. None of you are in any position to protest — "

Masami's gunsen impacted with his skull with a loud crack. There was a beat of silence. Birds slid slowly from Hayato's loosened grasp to the ground in a heap. His birds flew off with startled chirps, one calling out, "Birds is done in! Done in! Birds is done in!"

"Hieeeeeee!" Tsunayoshi squealed quietly. "But Masami-san, Kyoko-chan and Haru-chan?!"

She merely flicked an indecipherable look at him. "Watch."

Deep beyond the glacier chill, Masami felt a stirring of mild unease. What if she was wrong? What if Reborn was wrong? What if this would kill her three most "normal" friends, the three least involved in the fire-brightness of the Mafia and the Yakuza and even the biting of litterers on the street?

Masami had to give it to Reborn; he either had a communication device somewhere or his timing was truly excellent. Even as the mutilated hands of the Bloody Twins hovered distressingly over her friends' necks, they were defeated by the aged-up versions of those two children Tsunayoshi was always lugging around and Shamal, of all people.

Reborn smirked.

Masami chose to stay back with Reborn and Bianchi as Tsunayoshi, Hayato, and Takeshi dealt with the fake Rokudo Mukuro and tried not to be overly conspicuous with how truly awful she was feeling.

Bianchi sent her a sympathetic glance as Tsunayoshi dived out of the way of the interesting winds the fake Mukuro's weapon had whipped up. "Bad poison, is it? Sometimes, the antidote is just as bad as the poison."

Masami hummed noncommittally and hid the bottom of her face behind her tessen. Sometimes, having an awful immune system was a major inconvenience. She had no doubt that someone with better health would have recovered to a greater degree by now. It went against the grain to admit to weakness but lying so obviously was hardly acceptable either. So she said nothing and carried on watching as the three boys dodged this way and that and shouted at each other and generally were a mess, tactics wise, although they were doing well at not dying.

Someone, she thought, would have to teach them team maneuvers. She was already thinking up some when her mind hit the breaks and pointed out that it wasn't her responsibility.

Her mother had spent an entire trip trying to pound that into her skull, did she not learn? But if Masami didn't teach them, who would? To say Kyoya was interested in being a part of a team was just a little less likely than hell freezing over. Tetsuya, perhaps, but he wasn't suited for this world of mafia criminals and boys who could light themselves on fire.

Masami glanced at Reborn, who watched calmly as Tsunayoshi threw himself against the fake Mukuro, Hayato and Takeshi right behind him, pistol at the ready. Did she trust this Arcobaleno enough to leave these boys to him? This small hitman who was still the most dangerous creature in this park, who wanted her to join a criminal organization, who would force Tsunayoshi to become a Mafia Boss?

Bang!

Maybe so, she thought, so the fake Mukuro was defeated by a near-naked boy, a truly excessive amount of dynamite, and a bat-turned-sword. Maybe so, because she had already trusted him with the lives of three innocents and it was far too late to do anything else.

Was he clever enough to have arranged this slow progression of necessity-based trust? Or was he simply clever enough to manipulate events to his favor so as to get the results he wanted?

Masami made a note to evaluate his tactics later and use them herself in the future.

The maiko witch was being weird.

Hayato ran down yet another set of stairs and threw a wary look at Masami, who was keeping pace beside him. It didn't make sense that after she had so clearly been willing to drag down heaven and raise up hell to get her brother back, she'd barely intervened in the fights up till now, letting everyone else take the blows while she watched.

He would have thought that she was being a weak coward, except it was so obviously a lie, and Hayato was too smart to consider such fallacies.

Masami was, however much he might hate to admit it, strong. Hell, she had shown off her strength, hadn't she? Taunted them with how much more capable she was, how much more suited she was to being Juudaime's right-hand. She had never so much as flinched away from anything else before, no matter how outlandish it must have seemed to a civilian.

So what the hell was she doing now?

"I can't believe I was stuck with you while that baseball idiot is with Juudaime," Hayato grouched, because he meant it, and this, at least, was something he was familiar with. If it hadn't been Reborn who had asked, he would never have gone along with this arrangement. "What if Juudaime needs my help and I'm not there? If he gets hurt, I'm taking it out of your hide!"

Masami hummed lowly and said nothing. It was so blatantly unlike her to not take a shot at Hayato whenever she could that he was only more unnerved.

"Where the fuck are we going anyway?" he snapped in an attempt to hide it. "Do you have any idea where that monster of a brother of yours is in the first place or are we just going in circles, looking for a needle in the haystack?"

She sighed and finally said, "We're siblings, Gokudera-san. Not twins with psychic abilities."

Hayato frowned and rounded another corner. This place was like a maze. Masami's voice was soft and low, even, but there was something...

He turned to look at her, but before he could figure out what was going on, she was moving forward, suddenly intent and focused.

"Do you hear that?"

"Hear what?" Hayato replied, still irritated, but even as the words left his mouth, he knew what she was talking about.

"Let's sing together...Namimori Middle School!"

Hayato groaned and ran after Masami, who was already down the hall. "Of course. He would be the only guy in the school to actually like that stupid song."

When Masami found her brother, he was sitting on the dirty ground, skin a patchwork of bruises and cuts, blood smeared over the left side of his face. His posture indicated several broken ribs, and his clothes were dirty, stained with dust and grime.

She couldn't remember the last time she was this angry.

"Fuck," Hayato muttered behind her, but he had long since ceased to matter in her world.

"Onii-san," Masami breathed quietly, stepping over the wall she broke down to fall onto her knees beside Kyoya. Nothing was fatal, nothing that she could see, and that was a relief, but. But.

He frowned at her, the small yellow bird perched on his finger taking off with a chirp. "You were meant to guard Namimori," he said in clear reprimand, and she wasn't expecting the anger that lit up his eyes. Anger directed at her, for leaving behind the town when he was missing, for —

Masami pressed her lips together and tightened her grip on her tessen until it hurt. Now wasn't the time to argue with Kyoya. Now wasn't the time to forcibly remind him that Namimori was Kyoya's, not hers, that Kyoya was hers, and their difference in priorities had never seemed more infuriating.

"Here," she said instead and jabbed a syringe into his arm without warning. Kyoya's scowl darkened even as Hayato loudly demanded to know what she had done. She ignored them both. "Can you walk?" she asked because it was her job to be the pragmatic one here, to put aside irrationality and get things done.

Kyoya scoffed and pushed himself to his feet. Masami didn't offer a hand because that would have been an insult. Instead, she rose to her feet, closing her eyes momentarily against the wave of nausea that swept over her.

She weathered it like the rock that remained throughout all the ocean's tantrums and breathed.

Breathe.

"You're ill," Kyoya said, shoulders tense now. Behind them, Hayato made a soft sound, and Masami couldn't deal with all of this. Her brother needed medical attention, but first, Tsunayoshi and Mukuro were out of her sight, and that was unacceptable in this situation.

She spun on her feet. "Let's go."

No one tried to argue with her, which was probably for the best.

When Masami entered the cinema room, the scene that greeted her was so exceptionally strange, she was forced to pause for a moment.

Bianchi was backed up to the wall, face pale and hand over the stab wound on her stomach. Reborn stood in a corner with a slight frown on his lips. Tsunayoshi was huddled behind Takeshi, who was busy hacking at a pile of viciously hissing snakes gathered around them with his sword.

There was a boy standing in the middle of the room. A boy with spiky blue hair and a trident and a smug smile.

A threat.

"Masami," Kyoya growled behind her, impatient and annoyed.

She ignored him to throw her tessen at Rokudo Mukuro, as she had judged the boy to be. Having aimed directly at his head with no remorse and without having held back, Masami watched him easily deflect the fan with his trident with calm eyes. If she wasn't so angry, she might have been interested in the strength he flaunted with every move.

But she was and so she merely thought that going for the threat from the very beginning was evidently the right move, after all.

Hayato shoved past her. "What the fuck are you doing, you baseball idiot? Get out of the way! Juudaime, please take cover!" Takeshi threw himself over Tsunayoshi seconds before Hayato promptly bombed the attacking snakes to death.

"You're late," Takeshi said, laughing. He dripped blood on the floor from the cuts to his arms, to his chest. They hadn't had an easy time of it here.

"Shut up!"

"Kufufufu...and who might you be?" Mukuro smiled at Masami as if they were friends, although the bloodlust in his heterochromatic eyes said differently. A shiver ghosted down her spine. There was something terribly mad about him. "You wouldn't happen to be that one's little sister, would you? He was so very protective of you..."

Kyoya hissed like one of the dead vipers and moved to push past Masami. She threw up her arm before he could. Masami was no doctor, but even she could tell he wasn't in a combat-ready state. Not that she could stop him from fighting, not unless she killed him herself, but she'd have to be brain dead first before she let him go off by himself.

Look at the last time she had.

"That I am," and she smiled back at him because this was a game she knew how to play. "Greetings."

And she didn't bow nor did she introduce herself because even her manners had their limits. Stepping forward daintily, Masami smoothly gathered up her thrown tessen and slipped her gunsen into her other hand, all without looking away from Mukuro, who did nothing but smile. Kyoya shadowed her every step, his fury a palpable heat.

She ignored him. She was doing a lot of that tonight, more than she had ever done in her entire life. Kami, her head hurt.

"How angry you are," Mukuro told her as if she didn't know. "Are you here for revenge? Revenge is the most beautiful motivator."

"Yes," Masami murmured, "you're right."

When she lunged forward, it was with the knowledge that Kyoya was guarding her flank. They were at odds, the Hibari Siblings, but arguments couldn't destroy muscle memory nor years of fighting together. They moved like well-rehearsed dance partners, who knew the song and knew the dance, knew every step without even thinking.

The rest of the world faded away. The floor was clear. There were three dancers in this scene and each knew their role. Outsiders could get out and stay out.

When they came, Mukuro was ready for them.

He was fast, and he was strong, and still, he was not enough. They pushed him back steadily, for if he countered an attack from above, there was inevitably an attack from below. If he shifted attention to Kyoya, Masami was drawing blood. If he fended off Masami, Kyoya was ready to bash in his skull.

They had no mercy, the two of them. He deserved none.

Baring his teeth in a mockery of a smile, Mukuro leapt back for half a second. Indigo fire surrounded his right eye as the kanji for five appeared inside it — Mist, she thought, Mist.

"Be careful," Tsunayoshi was shouting, his voice so faint through the noise in her head that she could barely hear him. "Be careful, he can make illusions come to life!"

How charming.

Masami didn't care. Her heartbeat pounded in her ears.

This time, Kyoya lunged first. Masami followed, because that was what she did, and then they were dancing again. She ducked under the deadly swipe of Mukuro's trident and tried to rip open his stomach, nicking his side when he swayed back. He was stronger for some reason — a cut stung on her cheek, easily ignored — but no illusions appeared.

Mist Flames. What did she remember about Mist? Construction, illusions, sneaky, sneaky. But no snakes showed up to annoy them; no hell appeared to welcome them. What did she know of fighting Mist? Deception and misdirection; was she dreaming, was this real?

Masami could care, she supposed, but she didn't. She did her best to slit his throat.

You're compromised, her mother whispered to her from memory, but she didn't listen. White noise buzzed like agitated bees in her skull, nausea tugging at her stomach. Her balance was off, her balance was off —

"This is a waste of time," Mukuro sighed, jumping back again. "I suppose I should end this quickly." His red eye spun to show the kanji for one, and even as Tsunayoshi yelled something indistinct, pink petals were falling from the sky. Sakura trees reached up toward the roof beams, beautiful despite their treachery.

Everyone froze. Masami's breath caught in her lungs, an awful weakness gripping her muscles. If he had lied to her...

Masami watched Kyoya's knees tremble, just slightly, and somehow managed to hate Mukuro even more. She hadn't thought it possible but here she was.

"Kufufufu." Mukuro had seen it as well. His smirk was arrogant, the look of an enemy who had already won. He held his arm straight out so the middle tip of his trident rested gently against Kyoya's throat. Masami froze like a mannequin. "Come, kneel before me. I do so love symmetry in my acquisitions."

Quite possibly, for the first time in her life, Masami genuinely saw red. That might just have been her vision blurring at the edges though.

But before she could move, could intervene, Kyoya was slipped under the reach of the trident to brutally slam his tonfa into Mukuro's solar plexus. And Masami breathed out even as she threw herself after him, dealing a second blow to Mukuro's collarbone, only just barely missing his throat as he swerved backwards.

What a shame.

But Kyoya was the one who scored a bloody X across his chest, forcing him to cough out blood, and they had always been a family that believed in blood for blood. She could give this victory to her brother.

She didn't know how it happened.

One moment, she was kneeling over Kyoya's prone form, checking his vitals — he was alive, of course he was, of course, but he had pushed himself too far as she had known he would — and the sound of a bullet was fading from her ears. Her own panting breath disturbed the silence; her limbs were shaking.

Blood trickled down her cheek, dripped off her fan, Rokudo Mukuro was done for —

She had no regrets.

Tsunayoshi was spinning to stare at her, face twisted in anguish and horror, and what was wrong? She.

She —

Masami fell asleep.

The world shattered around her, and she knew this place, she did. She had dreamt it a long time ago, after a day spent meditating with Kyoya and a night spent in the garden. She had dreamt it, but it was different now. It wasn't hers. It was someone else's, and they controlled everything.

Gravity pressed against her. She tried to stand, but it compressed her limbs until she was kneeling and then lying. The floor was meant to be cold against her cheek — her cut cheek? but no, that wasn't important — but it wasn't. Everything was colored indigo, and she knew. She knew that —

Masami blinked, and it felt like waking up. She didn't know when she fell asleep, but she must have. An eye spun lazily before her; red like blood, red like fire. Kanji raced through that eye: one, two, three, four, five, six.

It was almost comforting to drift here, weight pressing down on her back. She was grounded and safe. Warm and at last, she no longer felt sick to her bones. There was something vibrating inside her skull, though, and it seemed frantic.

It felt like she was forgetting something.

She needed to wake up.

She needed to wake up.

Masami fell asleep.

Her world was red and black and a laugh that wormed its way down her ear canal to dig into the soft tissues of her brain. The inside of her eyelids were indigo, and something was wrong, even though everything was right. "Kufufufu, you're more trouble than I thought. But that doesn't matter in the grand scheme of my plans."

Masami was asleep.

She needed to wake up.

She was asleep.

"Stop struggling. You can't escape me."

Wake up!

She was asleep.

She was —

WAKE UP!

Masami opened her eyes and screamed.

And the world fell apart in purple and indigo and terror.

Masami woke up in the hospital with a blank spot in her memory and indigo spots in her vision. Reborn gazed at her evenly from the bedside table, and Tsunayoshi slept on a hospital chair, head hanging forward uncomfortably. He was going to get a crick in his neck, she thought nonsensically.

"You're the last one to wake up," Reborn said. "Shamal was afraid you had damaged yourself permanently, fighting against Mukuro like that."

She wasn't going to like this, Masami thought. After a cup of water, she said anyway, "Tell me."

She was right. She didn't like it.

Masami was home within two hours. She reassured Tsunayoshi absently, promising him that she was merely tired and wanted rest in the comfort of her own house. There was something intense and knowing in those orange-shaded eyes, but he took her words at face value and left to reassure Nana.

She wouldn't be able to misdirect him for much longer at this rate. He was growing in exactly the way she'd wanted him to, and she didn't like it.

Kyoya was still healing too, but she had been unconscious for a week, and he was already mobile. He greeted her with a stony face and a pot of tea. They knelt in seiza at the chabudai and drank through two entire pots before speaking.

Masami stared out the window the entire time and thought of someone else taking her body away from her. Taking her mind and crushing it beneath their feet. Taking her agency and control and power away in the most forceful of fashions. At the end of every day, she had always thought that even if she couldn't control anything else, she could control herself. She had prided herself on it, in fact, in being in perfect control of her being, every motion, nearly every emotion mastered.

She wasn't like Kyoya; she didn't need to control a town, a school, other people. She had only ever needed to control herself. It had been her last sanctuary, her last castle.

And someone had taken that away from her.

Kyoya was the one who spoke first. His words were brutal and dispassionate. "Your efforts have paid off."

She didn't know what he was talking about, and she couldn't muster the energy to try and decipher his meaning. "Pardon?"

"The omnivore. He defeated the trespasser." Bare and hard, a plain fact. Tsunayoshi had defeated Mukuro when neither of them could. If it wasn't for the little boy she had once saw crying at the playground, they would have died...or become puppets for Mukuro to play around with.

Masami gazed into her tea and was numb, empty. She wished for anger. Anger was more productive than this; she knew anger far more than she knew this. "Yes."

"It cannot happen again." This wasn't a request, nor a command. This was a decree, and Masami did not care for the things that she knew Kyoya was referring to — defeat; infringement upon his territory; another predator successfully asserting their dominance — but she agreed nonetheless.

Never again. This was in her power, what little power she had left. "No."

Kyoya frowned at her. There was an alertness to him that hadn't been there moments ago, as if he had just cottoned on to the fact that there was something very, very wrong with his little sister. "Masami," he demanded, and she was done.

She was done.

(He would never have tried to order her around before this. It was the wrong time for him to start.)

Like a ghost, she rose to her feet and glided into her bedroom before shutting the door. Opening her window, Masami sat down on the ledge and let the breeze rustle her hair. She would need to take a shower before leaving.

Noises wafted to her, but inside her being, all was quiet.

All was quiet.

Scenes came to her like a snapshot, like a camera shutter clicking a dozen times but with nothing to account for in between. Kyoya was angry at her, but his fury was cold and glacial, and Masami was already cold enough. She didn't let his anger touch her in fear of freezing.

Didn't he understand? A part of her, small and childish, wanted to scream at him, rage at him. This wasn't about winning or losing. This was about arrogance and stupid, stupid mistakes; this was about them thinking they were invulnerable when they weren't. This was about something far deeper than losing a battle.

This was about something worse than death, and she had once thought that there couldn't possibly be anything of that sort.

Tsunayoshi was worried. He hovered, looking like an abandoned puppy, and asked what was wrong, asked Reborn if she would be okay as if he thought she wouldn't know, wouldn't hear, and Masami said something she couldn't remember.

It didn't placate Tsunayoshi, and she felt vaguely that she should say something more, but the words wouldn't leave her mouth so she let Shamal and Reborn take care of it.

Reborn regarded her with blank eyes and said nothing. Nothing to her, but he asked for a phone call to her mother, and she gave that to him without hesitation. She didn't know what they discussed, and she didn't care.

Hayato smoked and seemed only more disconcerted when she looked right past him. She didn't know why; wasn't this what he had always wanted? Takeshi watched her with eyes that saw too much and gave her meaningless platitudes when the set of his lips said something else entirely.

Masami let her feet dangle in the pond and stared at the koi until the world around her faded away some more.

Rika arrived in two days. She took one look at her daughter and took her away.

Satoshi arrived in Berlin a day later. It had been years since Masami had seen her parents together, although she knew they traveled together when they could, but she couldn't muster up the energy to be surprised or happy about it.

Her lackluster greeting earned her a frown. Regardless of her listlessness, it was comforting to have her parents looking after her. It reminded her of gentler days, simpler days, when there were no bullets that could possess her and no lies to contend with.

Satoshi and Rika spoke over her head. They murmured terms like "forced Flame Activation" and "mental damage" and "Mist battle" but Masami could understand none of it and so she let herself drift off not long later. Nothing seemed terribly interesting or worthy of attention.

The day after, Rika dragged her out of bed to meet with an old man in a shady part of the city. He charged a few hundred euros before touching his hand to Masami's. His hand glowed bright yellow, and she would have jerked away but for Rika's hand on her back. A layer of warmth brushed over Masami, like a cotton blanket gently settling over her, and the doctor — for that was what he was, wasn't it? — drew back with a disinterested look. "Give her time," he said with a grunt and a dismissive wave of his hand. "She'll recover. The young ones bounce back quickly."

With that, they were shown the door, and Masami personally thought the whole thing was a waste of their time and money. Of course she would recover. She could have told her mother that herself. If she didn't, that would mean that Mukuro had succeeded in winning her, even from whatever hell hole they had dumped him in, and she couldn't allow that.

She couldn't.

"Quickly," the doctor had said, but recovery was slow and difficult and stretched out like the flow of cold molasses. Even with both Satoshi and Rika with her for the first two weeks, nothing was easy.

Rika dragged her out of bed every morning, sometimes physically, refusing to let her lay there and stare at the ceiling, waiting for indigo flames and a red eye to appear. They had to force her to eat more than two spoonfuls at every meal, everything bland as cardboard to her uncaring taste buds. Satoshi pushed her into training, into yoga, into something resembling a routine.

Masami didn't dance.

On day twelve, Satoshi sat her down and guided her through meditation, through feeling for the flames that danced in her soul. She felt nothing, but that was normal, or so he told her. He talked of Cloud and Mist and control, and she understood nothing of it.

At last, he said, "He took what was most important to you."

Yes.

At last, he said, "You are still you."

Was she? Was he certain?

And if she couldn't be herself, then what could she be?

It was midnight when Tsuna whispered into the darkness, knowing instinctively that his tutor was awake, "It's my fault, isn't it."

The thought, the truth, had plagued him ever since he saw Masami fall. That had been awful enough, but then she had stood back up, a twisted, unfamiliar, familiar smirk on her face, and he had felt ready to throw up.

It hadn't mattered that Mukuro had possessed her for less than two minutes. What mattered was the look on Masami's face when she left, so very unlike the Hibari Masami Tsuna knew. Masami was grace and sharpness and purpose — not lifeless, lost impassiveness, a blankness that had terrified Tsuna.

Reborn's voice was neutral, his hammock shifting with a soft crinkle of cloth. "It's a Boss' duty to protect his Family." Not confirmation nor denial. Just a statement.

Tsuna closed his eyes. He hadn't wanted to say anything to Gokudera and Yamamoto, who had both been hovering ever closer since Mukuro, because he knew they would disagree and try to persuade him otherwise. Right now, Tsuna didn't need that. He needed —

Ironically, more than anything else, he needed Masami's pragmatic honesty right now, her gently brutal advice, but she was gone. She was gone, and it was all Tsuna's fault, and he knew it.

He was the one who had brought the Mafia to Namimori. It was his birthright that had attracted danger. He was the one who Mukuro had been targeting. He was the one who had cowered while Hibari and Masami fought and —

He had watched as she had fallen and had done nothing. And then, she had left, and.

"Reborn…" Tsuna stared up at the ceiling but saw only the fall and then the numbness when she had awoken. "What happened to Masami-san really? What did Mukuro do to her?"

Reborn didn't answer for a long heartbeat. "I can only speculate," he said, "but most likely, when Mukuro possessed her, he had to fight her for control of her mind and body. He won and wounded her mentally in the process."

That...that sounded horrible. Oh Kami. A shiver went down Tsuna's spine. He fisted his hands in his sheets, almost wishing for the warmth of his gloves, thinking frantically of everything "mental wounds" could encompass. "Bu—But she'll recover, right? She won't stay like that forever?"

"The mind is a tricky thing. A mental injury isn't the same as a physical one. What happens next depends on Masami herself." The facts were laid down cold and clear in Reborn's childish voice and all the more devastating for it.

Tsuna bit his lip harshly and curled in on himself, wrapping his arms around his knees. In the hushed gloom, his eyes watered, the full impact of the situation striking him at last. To think that because of his mistakes and his weakness, Masami could be hurt for the rest of her life…

His trembling hands gripping his head, Tsuna trembled, feeling cold all over. What sort of friend was he? What sort of person was he? This was why he didn't want to join the Mafia, this was why the Vongola was a bad idea, why he could never, ever be a Mafia Boss —

Putting himself in danger was one thing. Putting his friends in danger? His first friend, the first one to truly believe in him, train him, invest time and effort and faith in him, and this was what he had done to repay her?

He didn't deserve Masami's friendship. Didn't deserve, didn't want this title that would fill his life and the lives of his friends with terror and peril, no, Tsuna had never wanted this —

"You're not giving Masami enough credit, Dame-Tsuna," Reborn interrupted before Tsuna's panic could snowball too badly.

Tsuna didn't reply, speechless from horror, breathless from resentment. He hated that his stupid, absentee father had given him his blood, hated that the Vongola had barged into his life as soon as it was convenient for them, hated that he had been so weak —

A sharp pain sliced through his arm. "Ow!" Glancing down, he saw a thin line of blood bead on his upper arm, a shuriken dropping to the ground with a low thud.

"Good, you're paying attention now." Reborn's voice was brisk and teacher-like despite having just thrown a weapon at his student. "Now use that brain of yours for once. Recovery from a physical injury takes time and care. Healthy people recover faster from a gunshot wound than ill people do. Mental injuries are the same. A strong mind will heal in time. They may not be the same as they were before, but no one ever is."

"Now, let me ask you." A hard pause. "How strong do you think Masami is?"

It took a moment for the words to sink into Tsuna''s mind. The answer came without hesitation and it wasn't even born from denial. "Masami-san's one of the strongest people I know," he stated firmly, and it wasn't precisely an absolution of his guilt but a piece of hope he could cling to.

He could believe in Masami. He did, of course he did.

But the problem remained. He never wanted this to happen again, and in an instant, Tsuna was struck by Masami's words from years back: "Willingly or not, there will be times in life when you must fight."

He hadn't understood at all back then, but now, he thought he might.

"Hey, Reborn."

"Yes, Dame-Tsuna?"

And Tsuna — because he could still feel the weight of a life (lives) pressing on his shoulders, because he was frightened of failing when failure had such harsh consequences, because he never wanted to be helpless again, because he could see the logic in becoming stronger even if he didn't ever want to be Mafia — Tsuna said, "Let's train tomorrow."

Colour leached back into the world slowly. It started with the small shops that Masami came across in her wanderings, because culture remained a deep love. Inside those stores, she encountered charming trinkets and handmade tapestries and cashiers who spoke a different language.

Curiosity whispered in her ears and knowledge tugged at her hands.

Different foods burst into vivid, brilliant flavour on her tongue, and she couldn't ignore that, no matter how much she tried. The street vendors called out to her in an unfamiliar tongue, and the most tantalizing smells curled around her like an old friend.

Masami smiled at the man who offered her chocolate mousse and it felt almost sincere.

Then came the libraries and museums, where she could curl up in a corner and nobody would bother her. Rika and Satoshi tried, but they touched her with hesitation in their fingers, and she didn't like it. They had never been so tentative before, and it made her feel fragile.

She didn't want to feel fragile. If she had to be someone else, had to be someone new and cracked, then she didn't want to be someone breakable.

Masami had never been breakable. Was she to start now?

She started to linger around the monuments and historical sights next. She read the plates. Touched the metal and stone. There was beauty here, beauty that humans had constructed, and she reminded herself of that, reminded herself that not everything was red and black and indigo.

It was when she was learning to delight in flowers and the sky again that she began to feel the presence inside her during meditations with Satoshi. It wasn't heat, wasn't burning, but she could sense it, almost coax it to her hand like a recalcitrant tiger being trained to obedience.

Three days later, purple flame danced in the palm of her hand with a ring of indigo on the border, and Masami almost broke down a wall trying to get away from herself.

Satoshi explained. He had married into the Hibari Clan, which was renowned for the Storm and the Cloud. His bloodline carried the Mist, and she was his daughter, Kyoya was his son; they had both shown indications of Cloud mixed with Mist. It wasn't anything to be afraid of.

This was who she was.

Masami didn't care. Masami wasn't listening. Masami thought, 'I am nothing like what he was.'

Kyoya had broken down and called a week after his sister left Namimori.

Rika had been unimpressed. But Reborn, the World's Strongest Hitman, had explained the entire unacceptable situation to her on the phone, and so, she had supposed she would be lenient and grant her son this one free pass.

A Hibari never took well to defeat. Failing in their self-proclaimed mission was another line not to be crossed. And letting someone under their protection get hurt?

She knew Kyoya must be smarting beneath all three blows.

Besides.

No chastisement of hers could match up to his own self-castigation. Of all the people who had laid the role on his shoulders, Kyoya himself took the responsibility of being Masami's big brother the most seriously.

"How is she?" came the quiet question today. Kyoya tended to call every five days, which was already a huge concession on the part of her reclusive son, but why he always had to call irritatingly early in the morning was beyond her

Rika considered Masami, who was mechanically tearing into toast with butter in the kitchen, and suppressed a sigh. They had been making progress. They had. She had told Satoshi not to go too far with the Flames.

Why didn't her husband ever listen to her?

"Coping."

"That's not good enough," Kyoya said darkly.

She could hear the scowl in his voice and was unamused. Her son still had so much to learn about people, about the world. "Sometimes," Rika said, "it's all we can do."

Kyoya was silent. And then, "Rabid carnivores have invaded Namimori."

Rika didn't like the sound of that. So very many intruders had been disrupting the peace of her children's home, and they had been suffering for it. "Who?"

"They call themselves the Varia."

"If you lose, you and all your little friends are going to die," the man named Xanxus said with a cruel smile and an aristocratic tilt to his head, feathers swaying in the wind. "Vongola Law."

'No,'  Tsuna thought, and it felt like a pledge. 'Not again.'

"We won't lose," he said, and there was orange in his eyes, steel in his voice, fire in his fists, and something like consideration made the Varia straighten up.

When Masami spent days doing nothing but sitting on a sofa in the local library no matter what they tried, Rika and Satoshi admitted defeat. For all that they were familiar with this world, it was not theirs. They didn't know enough about Flames, about the damage that a Mist could inflict on a mind.

And so, they brought her to China. To her granduncle.

"Masami." Ancient eyes watched her closely with a sereneness that prickled at her vaguely. It seemed terribly unfair that he could be so calm and centered while she drowned in her own chaos.

Despite wanting to lash out, Masami didn't show it. The face she greeted Fon with was blank in an entirely different way. "Fon-san," she said and bowed.

When he told her to follow him to his compound in the Chinese mountains, she did so without complaint. Distantly, she was mindful of the weight of her parents' gazes on her back, but she didn't look back.

Fon lived in a beautiful, isolated house with wide, gabled rooftops and red pillars. She didn't have to touch the walls to feel the age behind every brick. A family inheritance, she thought. Or perhaps he was simply that wealthy.

She imagined the Triads paid handsomely for their crimes.

Fon showed her to a room made up in soft greens and brown. Leaning against the wall was her luggage. "For however long you'd like to stay," he said gently, "this room is yours."

"Thank you."

Fon nodded in acknowledgement, his hands tucked in his sleeves. "Lichi is with a friend who's in need of her support, so it'll only be us here. When you're ready, find me in the courtyard and we'll get started," he said and left.

It was odd, Masami mused as she began to slowly unpack. Fon's words were soft, his actions deliberately non-threatening, but she didn't feel as if he was handling her with an invalid's pity and caution. Perhaps it was because he didn't act like he thought he could break her. Or, in this case, break her further.

The room was nice. It wasn't her bedroom, but it was nice.

Two hours later, Masami wandered out and drifted through the house. Most rooms were wide and open, colored in shades of white and cream, offset sharply with solid wood. Cherry? Or mahogany? Scrolls of Chinese calligraphy decorated the walls, sometimes accompanied by red paper cuttings of dragons and intricate flowers.

When she found Fon, he was sitting in full lotus on a smooth rock. All around him, trees with leaves the shade of the sunset waved slowly in the evening breeze. It was a beautiful garden. Deep within her came a pang; when was the last time she had tended her own garden?

"Sit," Fon said without opening his eyes.

She did so, knowing all the while that she would not meditate, would not again be confronted by the indigo of her own Flame. The grass was slightly damp beneath her fingers, the soil giving. An ant tripped over a pebble and got up again to keep going.

But Fon didn't tell her to meditate. "Breathe," he said instead. "Listen."

To what? There was the hum of the wind, the rustle of the leaves. The sound of the ripples as the fallen leaves landed in the small pond; the musical chitter and chatter of birds in the trees. The scampering of the squirrels, the quiet swish-swash of the water…

When Masami opened her eyes again, the moon was high in the sky. A waning gibbous.

Her mind was clear. The haze of frantic, rancor fear was, if not gone, banished for a short while. There was something resembling calm in her heart.

She was...surprised.

Fon smiled at her, having not moved a centimeter the whole time. "Well done."

Hayato lit a cigarette on Namimori Middle's rooftop and sighed. His battle was coming up soon, and he wanted to jump out of his skin a little. They may have won the Sun Battle, but Juudaime had put his foot down when it came to Lambo fighting and so they had forfeited the Lightning Battle.

One to one. It was all up to him to win now, and Hayato clenched his fists.

He wouldn't let Juudaime down, he resolved. He'd rather die first.

I assure you, a corpse has never been of any use to a leader, any leader, let alone a Mafia Boss. The maiko witch's annoying voice echoed oddly in his ears, and Hayato grimaced, a twinge of shame running down his spine.

There was no one watching, but he dropped his cigarette and crushed it under his foot anyway. Damn her.

He had no idea what the hell had happened to her, but damn her for leaving. Leaving Juudaime behind without so much as a word of explanation and not a single way to contact her. What the hell was that bullshit about "coming back if they called"?

He should have known she'd be unreliable. He should have kept Juudaime far, far away from her.

Maybe then Juudaime wouldn't be snapping his head up to look whenever the door opened only to get the most heartbreakingly disappointed expression on his face when he saw someone other than the maiko witch.

Besides, Hibari had been losing his shit lately. He had been fucking unreasonable since the witch had left, "biting" people to death for breathing too loudly and scowling murderously at Juudaime — when he wasn't beating them all into lumps of meat on the sparring mat, that was.

He had made it clear that Saturday training sessions were to continue, with or without the witch. But the first time they had showed up, he had immediately demanded that Juudaime show him "his new fangs" and all but beat Juudaime black and blue.

When Hayato and that baseball idiot had tried to intervene, Hibari had scoffed at them, called them "weak herbivores" and beat them black and blue, too.

Every session had been like that since. Things were a bit better since Reborn had let Juudaime use his incredible new X-Gloves but even then, they were outmatched once Hibari got used to the effects of the Dying Will.

If they had improved any by sparring against Hibari, Hayato was pretty sure the payoff in bruises wasn't worth it.

Since the Varia had shown up, Hibari had been even more shitty. He prowled around town with his tonfas out like he was just waiting to kill someone. Hayato was hoping for someone to send him to the mental asylum at this point.

"Fucking witch," Hayato muttered, stuffing his hands in his pockets. "If you can't even be here when Juudaime needs you, then what good are you?"

Fon watched his grand-niece stumble through the steps of making breakfast and thought, not for the first time, that this would be easier if it was just a Flame Wound.

Having been an acquaintance of Viper for decades, he was well aware of what Mists could do to a mind. How they could twist it and wrap it, turn a person into a caricature of themselves and drive them entirely mad.

This wasn't what had happened to Masami, thankfully. Whatever had happened — Rika and Satoshi hadn't been too clear on the details — Masami had had enough Will to pit her own against Rokudo Mukuro's and struggle hard enough that Rokudo had decided to let her go rather than expend his energy to fight both an inward and outward battle.

Some of the current loss of mental acuity was most likely her mind throwing most of its energy towards patching up the holes that Rokudo had left behind. But the rest...

No, what had caused most of the damage, Fon recognized, was a loss in identity and a shift in mentality.

The possession had robbed Masami of her sense of security and confidence. Knowing his relatives, her parents had trained her early on, giving her the strength that would enable her to feel safe and protected no matter the situation. That her brother all but ruled their town probably only added to that. Regardless of the threat, Masami had lived all her life knowing that she could take care of herself, and if she couldn't, her brother would ride to her rescue.

For that to have been ripped from her in such a traumatizing fashion by a force she couldn't fight much less see must have been a shock and a painful one, stripping away her mental defenses in addition to her physical ones. The dissociation and apathy was just her way of protecting herself when she was feeling lost and vulnerable. That she was primarily a Cloud who valued personal independence...really didn't help.

So the first thing he had to do was give her her autonomy back, Fon decided. Her choices, her strength, what she needed to get back on her feet rather than constantly stumble about, wondering when the ground would be pulled out beneath her again.

And then he could focus on giving her some real defenses for the next time she met a Mist. He knew that she would only truly recover when she could recover her faith in herself and her own strength, enough to meet any enemy, any Flame.

A week after she moved in, Fon casually led her to the middle of the forest that surrounded his home without a word of explanation. "Stay here for the next three days," he suggested —  ordered — with a small smile. "Tell me how you feel when you get back."

And with that, he leapt away.

Masami stared at the spot he occupied for a good thirty seconds before the words managed to process in her mind. Even through the blur, part of her was irritated with how slow she was these days, how the outside world was suddenly so much faster than it had been before.

It felt like she was sprinting just trying to keep up, and she hated it.

She catalogued herself. Masami had on a loose kimono that wouldn't keep her warm when night fell and her gussen. Nothing else. If she wanted to keep herself in comfort, then she would need to get moving. Glancing around revealed nothing but trees, trees, and more trees.

Masami picked a direction and started moving.

What was the point of this, she wondered as she stepped around bushes and avoid thorns. If Fon was anything like Reborn, he was probably observing her from afar with a pair of binoculars, but what did he hope to accomplish with this?

Masami could survive in the woods just fine; Satoshi had seen to that when she was young. For a moment, she thought of how he had brought her and Kyoya to the forests surrounding Namimori and taught them how to start a fire, how to hunt fish — but she shied away from the memory.

She didn't want to think about her brother. Now that she was no longer quite as numb as she had been, Kyoya's anger threatened to sting and burn, and Masami already had enough wounds to worry about.

Late that night, having found a flowing river that served well as a water source, Masami stared into the small, contained fire she had made and let her thoughts drift. Here, in the darkness, with the sound of the rushing water wrapped around her, she could almost sleep without fear.

Day Two saw her catch a rabbit in a half-hearted snare she set the night before. The poor creature squirmed and wiggled in her grasp. Alive, it was alive, and she was going to kill it. All that talk of herbivores and carnivores, and this was the true reality.

Nothing but death and violence and who held the most power.

How she hated that philosophy now. It meant she couldn't blame Mukuro, not really. It was just the dance, just the fight, and this was just losing. He didn't mean anything by it, she was sure. She was only another rabbit he had trampled over in his quest to survive.

Masami made sure her kill was quick. Merciful, if that could be applied to this situation. She skinned the rabbit and roasted it over her fire, looking away before she could see the searing flesh.

Away from the hustle and bustle of the cities, there was nothing to distract her from the noise inside her head. She closed her eyes and leaned back her head and tried to breathe. But there was no one but herself here,

That night, she dreamed. It was the same dream that had haunted her ever since the day she fell asleep.

She was running, she was dancing — and then she was immobile. Frozen in the air like a captured photograph, every muscle locked in place by some outside force. A marionette for someone to play for, a pawn in someone else's chess game.

And always, that same laugh echoed in her ears.

Kyoya rolled a half-ring around his fingers absently. The breeze on the school's roof was warm, the sun searingly hot and bright, and he was irritated by it. These days, he was irritated by everything.

The rabid carnivores who had invaded his town and were keen on causing damage to his school most of all.

He wanted them gone. His tolerance for mafia antics was at an all-time low, and he had already bitten the omnivore and his herbivore crowd to death a dozen times this past month in retaliation. But to remove these interlopers from his territory...

According to the baby carnivore, they had to follow some foolish mafia rules. Kyoya had no intention of following any rules but his own, but the other option was the rabid carnivores wrecking havoc on his peace and his town, so he would follow along until he could bite them all to death.

Tension coiling back in his shoulders, Kyoya returned his attention to the half-ring he had been given by the baby carnivore.

"The Cloud Vongola Ring," he had said with some measure of the mischief that normally resulted in damages that gave his sister headaches. Had given his sister headaches. "If you want to compete, you need to accept this."

Kyoya hadn't nearly been as interested in the details of Flames and Vongola and Guardians as Masami had been, but she had given him the basics. If he chose to fight in the Cloud Battle and take the Cloud Ring, he was essentially pledging himself to the omnivore for life.

It was a repulsive thought. But then, so was allowing the rabid carnivores to remain in his territory. And...the small animal had been improving recently, if at a glacial speed. His conviction when facing the intruders had been almost respectable.

Kyoya wasn't interested in thinking of the omnivore as a younger sibling or student or whatever it was that drove Masami to look after him and his crowd of herbivores like the mother hen she most certainly was not. All he cared about was whether or not Sawada Tsunayoshi was strong enough to present a challenge.

At the rate he was progressing, Kyoya could almost see the impressive pack leader he would grow into. And...well, he was very small and fluffy, that Kyoya couldn't deny.

And his sister, he knew instinctively, would never follow the small animal. She had been his mentor for too long, her protectiveness too ingrained. She would want him to watch over her ducklings while she was away.

Kyoya slipped the ring on his finger and stood up.

(He refused to dwell on thoughts of his baby sister. She was a carnivore, a Hibari. She was his little sister. She would recover and come back to their territory, and then he would make certain that no scavenger would ever touch her again. He would entertain no what-ifs that suggested otherwise.)

On the third day, Masami sat on the shore of the river and found herself disinclined to move. There wasn't much point, was there?

So, she sat there. Her mind felt like a blank slate or maybe the black of a starless night. There was the white noise of the burbling river and the soft rustling noises of the forest, and for a long time, she thought of nothing at all.

Fish darted through the currents like silver streaks, like the flash of steel. Her hands seemed empty without her fans. And Masami closed her eyes.

She had been weak. Overconfident. She had said she was just a small fish in a big ocean to Takeshi, but had she believed it, truly believed it?

No. Not really. Saying something and believing in it were two different things, and she had never understood that so well.

And...making herself responsible for three boys, for a committee, for a school, for a town? Had she really thought herself so instrumental to those lives? They were doing just fine without her, weren't they?

She'd refused to talk to Kyoya over the phone, but her ears still worked, and she'd eavesdropped easily. Mafia Assassins and a disposed heir, Flame Rings and battles on the school's rooftop.

She wasn't...all that important to others. Here, now, what help did those relationships offer? There was only her, alone in a forest, alone with the grass growing around her and the birds flying high in the sky.

There was life around her, self-sufficient and flourishing, and if the fish beneath her feet could do it, then why not her?

She could survive. She could continue on. She wasn't. She refused to be prey.

When the moon was peeking up over the horizon, Masami dragged herself back to Fon's house. Physically, she was fine. There were scratches on her ankles and dirt stains on her kimono. Her hair was greasy.

Emotionally, mentally...she was tired. Tired and melancholic and a bit sad but not empty, not numb. There was a sense of peace, of purpose creeping up at the edges of her mind now, and when she saw Fon waiting patiently for her at the doorway, she could smile a little and not feel like a fraud.

"Reborn...!" Tsuna gasped, aghast. "You're not telling me that our Guardian of Mist is Rokudo Mukuro?!"

"That's exactly what I'm telling you," Reborn responded evenly.

"But — " Tsuna shook his head, not even sure how he was meant to protest. "But — Masami-san — "

"Yeah, are we just supposed to accept him as an ally after what he did?!" Gokudera demanded aggressively, chewing on an unlit cigarette.

Reborn held up a hand. "He was our best choice for the moment. Have you forgotten the stakes?"

"No...but still..." Tsuna went silent, conflicted. At his side, Yamamoto hip-checked him reassuringly. They watched the battle of illusions commence, watched Mukuro win, and when he turned to them, everyone went tense.

Tsuna spoke first. "Thank you," he said and it was as sincere as he could make it, because Reborn was right, the stakes were too high. Mukuro looked surprised, but before he could respond, Tsuna continued, "Thank you but I won't forgive you for what you did."

"Kufufufu..." Mukuro smirked, as smug and confident as ever. "I would expect nothing less, Sawada Tsunayoshi." With that, he fell forward and transformed back into Dokuro Chrome. Tsuna really had no idea how that worked.

"Man," Yamamoto said, folding his hands behind his head, "let's hope Hibari never finds out about this."

Tsuna cringed at the thought.

She relearned how to dance slowly.

Masami did so in the forest, in the garden. Nature was harmonious and nonjudgmental; the trees stood guard over her and would remain long after she was ashes on the wind. Human malice didn't exist in sloe-eyed deer and the squirrels who chattered at her.

She danced with no music. There was only the beat of her heart, from which she had first learned to dance so long ago. Sometimes, there was the quiet trickle of the river, the rustles of the leaves, but often, there was just the sound of her footsteps to keep her company.

Fon let her wander the clearings as she desired. He was away on his own business sometimes but generally returned within a day or three. His company was a muted one; they didn't talk much but they ate dinner together and his was a presence she could feel reverberate through the walls.

At night, he sometimes invited her to sit with him. Each and every time, Masami would intend to enjoy the peace and quiet only. Yet, she found herself beginning to meditate, falling back on old habits despite herself.

Her Flame still dwelled deep within her chest, she could feel it, but she flinched away from calling it to her hands once more. Perhaps it was avoidance, perhaps it was fear, perhaps it was cowardice, but she was at last regaining a shred of her composure and she didn't want to lose it once more.

Fon watched on the sidelines and made no attempt to intrude but for short pieces of enigmatic wisdom casually dropped each night before bed.

"Nothing has no meaning until we give it meaning," he had said once.

And the next night, "You must learn to let go of the idea that you must always be who you have always been."

Most devastatingly, "Accepting only part of yourself is a great disservice."

"To who?" she had asked.

Fon had blinked at her as if it was obvious. "To yourself, of course."

Two weeks into her stay, Masami ventured out to the nearby city. It was vibrant. Bustling. So full of life and energy that she wandered the streets for hours, trying desperately to absorb that warmth. On nothing but a quick whim, she bought a postcard and sent it to Tsunayoshi.

He was probably worrying himself sick, she knew.

When she came back to Fon waiting in the garden, smelling of the street food she had eaten and with more energy in her veins than she'd had in weeks, Masami felt almost as if her feet were planted firmly on the ground again.

"Let's dance," she said on another whim, and Fon's smile was small and full of pride.

(What she didn't know was that by the time the postcard would reach Namimori, Tsunayoshi would be missing. Kyoya would be prowling the streets, searching for three missing students, debating whether or not to call his mother and ask her to put him in contact with Masami.

Only...a day after that, Hibari Kyoya would be missing, too.)

Healing hurt.

With the apathy wiped away, Masami was fully, clearly aware of just how far she had let herself fall.

When she woke in the morning, gasping, drowning in indigo nightmares and wanting nothing more than to remain in bed for the rest of the day, she remembered how once she had woken up with aspirations at her fingertips and confidence in her place in the world.

The steps of the dance came with a hesitance that infuriated her. She had once been quick-footed and elegant. She had been grace and certainty on the dancefloor, and now, she had to relearn the rhythm of everything all over again.

Sparring with Fon was always an exercise in frustration. He was calm and unperturbed no matter what she did, and inevitably, resentment would well up in Masami's chest, heavy and bitter. Her weakness made her tremble late at night with disappointment.

And that was the worst of all. Her emotions were erratic and punishing, her words tripping out of her mouth with jagged edges. Uncertainty tainted her every move; it was hard not to jump at indigo shadows.

If her past self could see her now, she would hate the person she had become, lacking in self-control and self-confidence with tattered dignity and no poise.

Masami gritted her teeth. She raised her chin. Grasping her stubbornness and the shreds of her pride in a bloody grip, she straightened her back. And she continued dancing.

Slowly, slowly, she rebuilt herself, step by step.

Masami was walking through the city late at night when she heard it. It had been a hot, humid day that had bordered on unbearable, and the evening breeze was comfortable. The side streets she liked to roam were empty, and so the strangled scream easily caught her ear.

She hesitated. And despised herself a little for it.

The weight of her fans were heavy in her sleeves. She never went anywhere without at least one these days. It was a comfort and a security blanket both, and she knew it. But she was growing stronger these days, body and soul — Fon had said so, and he didn't believe in empty compliments either — and another desperate cry made up her mind.

Masami took a deep breath and went looking for trouble. Maybe she had spent too long tagging along on patrols with Kyoya, and a quiet whisper of homesickness touched her at the thought. It had been a while since she had talked with her brother.

The scene she came across was vile, and Masami didn't pause to think. She was stepping forward and throwing her tessen at the man crouching over a weeping woman with her blouse half undone before considering the consequences, and it felt right, bright like a blade's sheen.

The bastard was knocked back, and his would-be victim scrambled to her feet, backing away to seek protection from Masami. "Thank you, thank you, thank you," she wept, mascara running down her cheeks in streaks of black.

She supposed she should be feeling pity. She didn't. "Are you hurt?" was all that Masami asked.

"No, no, I — don't — what should I do?"

"Go find the police," Masami said and didn't move even as the woman darted off with another sobbed thanks. She was eyeing the man struggling to pick himself off of the dirty cement and wrapping her fingers more firmly around her gunsen.

He was bleeding from the nose, the red astonishingly vivid amongst the grime and the falling dusk. Masami felt a strange sort of fascination, an odd excitement sweeping through her lungs and quickening her breath. Her fingers tingled gently as she reached down to pick up her tessen.

So weak, she thought, and it was a familiar thought. She remembered standing to the side as her mother slit the throat of another weak, disgusting man, and for the first time in a long while, Masami didn't feel incomplete or broken or helpless.

She felt powerful, and it was the headiest feeling in the world.

The rapist swallowed hard, staring up at her with wide eyes, and began to scramble backwards on his hands and knees. What he saw on her face, she couldn't imagine. And —

It would be so easy, wouldn't it? So very, very easy. All she would have to do was step forward and one easy arc of her fan would be enough.

(There had been a time when she considered murder beneath her, a precious waste of potential. She wondered where that mindset had gone.)

It was the shadows on the walls of the street that caught her eye. Flickering and unnatural in the diffused light. Another enemy? But no, when she glanced around for a light source, she found only the purple Flames that danced around her fingertips.

Masami stared at the Cloud Flames and then at her would-be victim. He was pale and shaking, sweating and so clearly prey. Her heart pounded in her chest, and she. She —

— forced herself to turn and walk away.

"You're Flame Active now," Fon said gently, pouring her a cup of tea. "And a Misty Cloud no less. Such combinations are known for their volatile emotions and eccentric behavior."

"Is that what they call it?" Masami said with a hint of her normal sharpness. It all sounded like excuses to her.

"Whatever they may say, always be sure that you control your Flames and your Flames do not control you."

Control. Discipline.

Yes, Masami could do that.

A bare week later, Masami was standing by the river when she collapsed to her knees, an explosion ripping through her mind.

!?

And she remembered — remembered a future that wasn't hers, sifted through the memories of an individual she hadn't yet become.

It felt like a terrifying dream, but she knew it was real.

For some given value of real.

'Oh, Tsunayoshi, what have you done now,' was her last thought before the memories swamped her.

The Future That Never Was

Masami walked down the hallway, her boots silent on the floor. There was a streak of dried blood to her right; one of the newbies, no doubt. She made a note to notify house cleaning before the day's end. Intimidation was all good and well, but these were private levels and she enjoyed sanitary conditions when she could.

A few passing Storms, looking tired and vaguely smug, nodded respectfully to her as their paths crossed. Masami nodded back and kept going, tendrils of her upswept hair swaying in front of her eyes as she walked up the stairs. Her short yukata rode up over her garter, exposing the small knives she had been given for her twenty-third birthday. It was an odd sensation when she was used to keeping her weapons fully concealed. But this was headquarters, and Masami could dress how she wanted here.

She reached the double doors and knocked perfunctorily before slipping in. "Boss," Masami greeted.

Xanxus looked up from his pile of paperwork. "What, trash?"

"We've got reports coming in about a teenage Sawada Tsunayoshi."

Chapter Text

Paso Doble: a passionate Latin dance of conquest based on Spanish bullfighting.

The Future That Never Was

For all his strength, the Vongola Decimo looked as anyone would look in a hospital bed, surrounded by machines that breathed for him. Mortal, feeble, and all too human.

Masami couldn’t help but resent him for it, irrational though it was. How dare he injure himself into a coma by beating Gesso Byakuran half to death and then taking on an invasion force to get Giglio Nero’s Uni into safe hands? How dare he ruin all her years of hard work?

“Signora,” a servant said, stepping up to her with a neatly folded towel and a dip of her head. Ah, she was getting blood on the floor. How rude of her.

Masami took the towel and wiped off her gunsen. “Apologies,” she said to the servant, who only nodded in acknowledgement and retreated. The doctors had already come by to inquire about the dried blood on her clothes. None of it was hers.

She glanced at the nearest clock. She would need to check in with Squalo soon or she’d get an earful when she got back to the Compound. Then again, she was already due for a long lecture after she had gone off with Kyoya and demolished two Millefiore bases in Sicily without warning or approval. Being ten minutes late to a check in wasn’t much of an infraction compared to that.

Familiar footsteps in the hallway. “Hey.” Takeshi sat down next to her, stretching out his long legs. For once, he seemed to have nothing to say. There were dark shadows under his eyes, no smiles on his face.

It had been a difficult two weeks for everyone.

“Signor Irie?” Masami didn’t really approve of the plan, but she had grown more selfish as the years had gone by. If this was really the only chance they had of keeping Tsunayoshi alive long enough to heal…

“Yeah.”

She would never have even considered this option before becoming so entrenched in the Mafia. What had it made her? “Children don’t belong in war,” she said.

Takeshi looked up at the ceiling. “I think past-me would understand. If it’s for Tsuna.”

“Would he really? Saving this Tsunayoshi in exchange for endangering his Tsunayoshi?”

He huffed a weak facsimile of a laugh. “Yeah, you’re right. He might understand, but he probably won’t approve. That’s okay, though.”

“So it’s been decided?”

“Yeah. You’ll tell Xanxus?”

Masami twisted the Varia Cloud Ring on her finger and closed her eyes. “He already knows.”

!?

Masami laid on the grass for several long minutes, just trying to breathe. She had probably passed out for a few seconds there.

When she could move without feeling faint, she settled herself into seiza and tried to meditate. Whereas before her mind had been too empty, now it was too cluttered. Trying to sort through everything that had just been brutally hammered into her brain took her the entire night.

It was...a lot. Blood and Flame and War. Family and Death and Loyalty. It wasn’t hers. This her. But it had been a version of her. And really, what was identity but a collection of memories?

When dawn came, she rose to her feet and called her mother.

“Masami?”

How strange. It had been a long time since her mother's voice had comforted her so. Since toddlerhood, surely.

“Okaa-san,” Masami greeted, closing her eyes against the morning light with a smile that barely touched her lips. “It’s good to talk to you.”

Fan was waiting for her on his doorstep. “You’re leaving?” It was phrased as a question, but it clearly wasn’t.

Masami nodded, and the movement held an edge of unfamiliar authority. “Thank you for your hospitality, Fon-san. Before I go, I’d like to beg one more favor. Do you know how to avoid Mist Tracking?”

Fon’s smirk was a sly, cold thing. “I do.”

She was on a plane a day later.

Masami stared out the passenger window and lifted her chin. If nothing else, that would-be future had wiped away the fog, bringing the world back into pristine focus. Her finger felt odd without a ring on it.

She wasn’t fragile. She wasn’t breakable. She wouldn’t let herself be. She had once stepped on a battlefield and brought her enemies to their knees. That was who she was, who she wanted to be, and who she would be.

Masami was grateful to her would-be future self for the wake-up call…but the decisions that her had made in a world-that-wouldn’t-exist-anymore were the first things that she had cast aside when packing.

Her choices were her own.

And Masami would do as she pleased, Varia or not.

The Future That Never Was

Masami flicked the blood off her gunsen with a snap of her wrist. “Any casualties?” she asked the Squad Leader who came to stand beside her.

“Fifteen,” he responded. “Ten of the rookies, one of the Sun medics, and four Lightnings.”

“Commence standard operation,” she ordered. Masami was already dreading Leviathan’s yelling. He really needed to stop churning out suicidal Lightnings. “Take five of their guns back with us after having a Mist check them for traps. That one I relieved of an arm and leg is to be brought back for interrogation.”

He nodded sharply and left without another word. Masami turned her attention back to the Millefiore Squad Leader under her boot. No doubt he’d have tried to commit suicide by now if there weren’t a dozen hairpins keeping him crucified to the ground.

As it was, he could do nothing but glare up at her, the hatred a poor mask for fear. But it was exactly his fear that she wanted.

“You’re the sniper who put Squalo in a sling for a week,” she told him casually. “Do you know how much paperwork was foisted on me as a result?”

He said nothing. That was alright. She put even more weight on the foot crushing his chest and watched him try to breathe through the pain. Squalo was a very loud invalid, that one week had probably destroyed years of her hearing.

Within the Varia, those who lost in battle were killed as a mercy. Better an ally than an enemy. Better a quick death than days of torture. Better a dead end than a possible leak. Everyone knew, understood, and accepted this deliverance for what it was when they first joined.

That didn’t mean the Squad ever let the perpetrator go. As long as they weren’t Family, anyone who killed one of theirs would forever be listed in their black books, one of the people all members had the authorization to kill on sight without a prior contract. And that was in times of ‘peace’.

Masami was the Cloud Officer. This was war.

She didn’t need to justify her actions to anyone. If Xanxus himself was here, he’d shove her aside and do the job with his own two hands.

Two days later, there was a knock on Fon’s door. A knock and a yell.

“OPEN UP THE DOOR, YOU!”

He had been expecting this. Fon met the Varia gathered on his doorstep with a serene smile. “Can I help you?” he asked, hands hidden within his sleeves.

Superbia Squalo glared down at him. “You know exactly what we want,” he snapped. “Where is she? The Boss wants to talk to her.”

“Not here,” Fon said honestly. “I don’t know where she went either.”

“YOU! YOU’RE SAYING WE CAME ALL THIS WAY FOR NOTHING!?” Squalo yelled.

“That does sound about right.” Fon nodded. Lichi, perched on his shoulder, nodded with him.

Squalo’s left eye seemed to have developed a painful twitch. He should probably get that looked at.

The Future That Never Was

The instant Tsunayoshi had heard about the Anti Trinisette Radiation the Millefiore had released into the atmosphere, he had called all of the Arcobaleno within his reach to the Vongola Mansion and told them in no uncertain terms that they weren’t allowed to leave.

(“Yes, no matter how many bullets you shoot at me, Reborn.”

“Hmph. You’ve gotten cocky, Dame-Tsuna.”)

He then set Verde, Giannini, Talbot, Shamal and all the researchers he could possibly employ on creating filtration devices and antidotes before flying over to Uni as fast as possible to fuss like a mother hen even though she wasn’t even affected by the radiation.

All typical Tsunayoshi behavior and not anything that Masami would usually be concerned about. However, with Mammon now out of commission, the entire Mist Division was unsupervised and that was never a good state of affairs for anyone. They weren’t like the Cloud Division, which had survived for years without leadership. The Mists needed a corralling hand.

“Him? Him?” Bel demanded, pointing a finger at the best candidate they had for an Acting Mist Officer on such short notice. “No. Absolutely not. The Prince will not work with such a disrespectful and unpleasant peasant. Find someone else.”

“Are you even a real prince?” Fran wondered openly, his usual bored expression unchanging. “Or are you just self-appointed?”

“You dare to question the Prince's Royal Status!? So it's execution you want, is it!?”

“If not him,” Masami said over the sounds of knives puncturing the walls, “then Mukuro.” Bored, battle-trigger Mists off-mission were the stuff of nightmares, often literally. Her newest baby Cloud had wrecked the hallway outside of her office just yesterday after one too many Mist-touched nightmare.

“What!? How!? Why!? He’s not even in the Varia!” Leviathan’s hair was all but crackling in his disbelief and outrage. Even his mustache.

Masami’s calm voice never changed as she replied, “Tsunayoshi said he could lend him to us for the time being since he was the one who took Mammon away.”

CRASH!

Xanxus snarled, his full glass of wine shattered and spilling down the already hole-ridden wall. “Like hell I’ll accept his fucking handouts! GET LOST AND CLEAN THIS SHITSHOW UP!”

And so, Fran became the Acting Mist Officer to everyone’s general dismay.

To possess knowledge about the future, a future, was a strange thing, Masami found. She knew skills she hadn’t learnt yet, languages she’d never heard. But it was a tenuous thing, this knowledge, like a dream that could slip through her grasp if she wasn’t careful.

Hibari Masami was not known for being careless. Hibari Masami would not allow herself to be careless.

The best way to reinforce knowledge was to practice it. In the frigid Russian mountains, she moved slowly through the new forms, adjusting moves to her current body. Odd to think that someday she would have more height, more reach, but that was the future and this was the present. The Russian language tripped haltingly off her tongue at first. The muscle memory wasn’t there but that was alright. She stayed in Yekaterinburg for a week before leaving for Kolkata. From what faint memories she could grasp, she had enjoyed their bharatnatyam dances.

On the edge of an Indian desert, Masami waited for night to fall. When the darkness came, she closed her eyes and reached for fire and warmth, Flame and Will. When she opened her eyes, the world was lit up in purple with a tinge of indigo.

Resolve, hmm?

She wanted to be herself, free from outside influences. She wanted to dance across the horizon, moved only by the direction of the wind and her own fancy. She wanted to do as she wished, unbothered by the weight of other people’s expectations. Did that count as resolve?

(She wanted to be unafraid, as that future-her had been unafraid.)

Propagation was the attribute of the Cloud Flame. Propagation...didn’t that just mean more? Increase, spread, exponential growth? More, more, more. More space, more strength, more speed, more everything.

Wasn’t that lovely? She had always wanted the world at her feet, hadn’t she?

The Future That Never Was

Masami woke up on the Boss’ couch with Belphegor leaning over her with a knife in one hand, his face much too close to hers for comfort.

All she did was blink in surprise. “Greetings. Can I help you, Your Highness?”

“The Right-Hand wants to talk to you,” he said with a scowl and rocked back on his heels to show her a cell phone.

Ah. Of course.

Masami held back a grimace and adjusted herself so she was sitting properly. She had just spent a month in California, ripping apart one of Millefiore’s weapon manufacturers and getting very little sleep as a result, hence why she was in the Boss’ office. Much lower chance of being disturbed here than in her actual bedroom.

Figures that she’d be needed during the first real rest she’d gotten in weeks.

“Greetings,” Masami said into the phone that Belphegor handed her. She glanced at Xanxus to gauge whether he wanted her to take her call outside, but he was bent over his paperwork and seemed unconcerned. So he preferred to eavesdrop now rather than make her give him a separate report later then.

“What the hell are you doing sleeping at a time like this!?” Hayato bit out over the line, already on speaker. “That damned brother of yours and the fucking pineapple are making a mess of things over in Sicily. Call them off before they piss off the Vindice again, would you?”

It was truly unfortunate for everyone that one of the few things that could make Kyoya and Mukuro cooperate turned out to be Tsunayoshi’s near-death.

“Where’s Signora Chrome?” Masami asked instead of sighing heavily like she wanted to. Belphegor perched on the couch armrest, blatantly and unashamedly listening in. No doubt this was more entertaining than paperwork or marking the recent casualties within his Division.

Hayato made a frustrated sound. She knew from experience that he was probably pacing right now, his hair a bird’s nest. “She’s laying a fake trail in Florence. We can’t afford to break her cover over something like this.”

Which left her as the only person who might be able to get Kyoya and Mukuro to listen, especially when they were fanning each other’s bloodlust higher and higher. Nevermind that she didn’t even have a co-Guardian Bond to curb her long-held distaste towards the Mist like Kyoya did.

Masami closed her eyes. “I’ll take care of it. Was there anything else?”

There was a pause. “What do you think we should tell the Tenth — the past Tenth, I mean — when Shoichi makes the switch? Back then...you two were close.”

To the side, Xanxus snorted openly.

Masami agreed: what could there possibly be to say in a situation like that?

Kyoya hadn’t seen his baby sister in that strange almost-future. He had been too busy fighting a war and keeping the herbivores alive. But he’d had his future self’s notes and working ears. It hadn’t been difficult figuring out what Masami had gotten up to.

And ten years of change was nothing. He had known her since she was born. Kyoya would know Masami wherever and whenever.

When she finally called a week after leaving their granduncle, he said, “You remember.”

It wasn’t a question, but she responded, “Yes.”

“Have you recovered?” These nights, he closed his eyes and saw a battlefield. The older members of Tsunayoshi’s herd had tried to keep them away from the battle as much as possible, but their efforts had been in vain.

Not when they had been the only weapons that were effective against that feral white parasite.

He knew the small animal was still having nightmares. Some of the herd had faced the basic law of life and death better than others. Kyoya’s parents had ensured he’d known that law since he could conceptualize it, but sometimes, even he thought he could see the blood dripping off his tonfas.

It had been a long, drawn-out battle to the bitter end.

“Does it make a difference?” Masami asked, and in her even voice, he found his answer. The faint background noises that filtered through the receiver were all in a language he was unfamiliar with. “What do you remember?”

She was right. ‘Recovery’ meant nothing these days. Yamamoto Takeshi had almost decapitated a Namimori student yesterday when she had come up behind him without warning. “Six months of waging war.”

“Nothing else?”

Kyoya frowned at his sister’s garden. It had grown unruly in her absence. He would prune the bushes tomorrow. “No. You do?”

“...you were taken physically to the future. It makes sense that you would only remember what you witnessed yourself,” Masami mused. There was a crispness to her speech that was new. That felt...like their mother. “I received a year’s worth of memories from my future self.”

He took a moment to peruse through all of the implications within her words. Of the reality of having memories of both a 14-year-old self and a 24-year-old self. At least there would be no glaring disparity between her strength and the pack’s. She would not be left behind in this increasingly perilous world. “The omnivore has been asking after you.”

“Is he not a carnivore by now?”

“No. He still prefers talking over fighting.” Had in fact lost his temper a month into their stint and roared at Kyoya and that rotten Mist scavenger to ‘sit down and cooperate before we all get killed because you can’t stop fighting for a single second!’

It was the first time Kyoya had considered the omnivore a passably respectable pack leader. Of course, he had still bitten him to death later for the insult.

“I don’t have a cell phone right now. They’re too traceable,” Masami said. “But in two day’s time, please inform him that I expect him to have access to his landline at eight in the evening.”

“Will you return?” Not a question he would have expected to ask even six months ago. Given all that had happened since then, Kyoya wondered if it wasn’t for the better that his sister seek out her fortune away from Namimori.

He had vowed to protect her. Vowed to protect this town but, though it was infuriating to admit it, he wasn’t infallible. The war had shown him that. With all of the scavengers the omnivore naturally attracted, the smallest slip could result in Masami getting hurt again. And next time, she might not be able to recover.

“If I have to,” Masami said.

But not if I don’t, went unspoken.

The Future That Never Was

Masami flipped through report after report on troop movements, enemy intelligence, and resource consumption. It was nearing two in the morning, and her eyes ached. War generated a terrible amount of paperwork.

She signed off on a request for additional ammunition acquisition for the Storm Division — they went through theirs the quickest, to Mammon’s many complaints even on their sickbed — and threw a dagger at the second-rate assassin trying to sneak up on her from behind.

The corpse fell to the floor with a dull thud and promptly started to stain the carpet. Masami sighed and destroyed the body with a light touch of Flame. This was the third time this week and it was only Tuesday.

She hated living in these temporary bases. This never would have been an issue at the Compound.

The worst part was missing people she hadn’t met yet. She missed her Box Weapon, Fuji, most of all. If they didn’t construct her again in this reality, someone was going to meet the wrong edge of her fans.

Masami did find that one pastry shop owner in Florence though. His pain au chocolat really was to kill for.

And that was another thing. In Malacca, five thugs attempted to ambush her on the street while she was looking for a weapons shop that had come highly recommended to her by Squalo — seven years in the future or three years in the past. Time travel really did ruin your sense of linear time.

Masami walked into that store with her fans stained with blood. She felt vaguely that she should feel more perturbed than she was. Shouldn’t murder make her hands shake? Shouldn’t she have felt something more than annoyance when she burnt those bodies to ash?

Yes, she had become desensitized to Rika killing in front of her but this was still the first time she had killed with her own two hands…in this timeline.

Yet, when the owner asked to see her hands for a sense of what weapons would suit her, they were completely steady. She purchased a selection of thin knives and left with a polite smile.

Yet, she continued on with her affairs as usual. That night, she called her mother and asked how to cover up the smell of burning flesh.

Yet, Masami looked herself in the eye in the bathroom mirror the next morning. She didn’t flinch from the steel and ice she found there.

If the best way to ensure her freedom was through strength, then so be it.

If the most efficient path to her goals was a straight line through her obstacles, then very well.

If there was one thing her past had taught her, it was that the best defense was power.

If there was one thing a future had taught her, it was that the best offense was power.

Fine. Masami didn’t think that the things she wanted were unreasonable. Dance and travel and the open skies. If power was what it took to get her those things, then she’d become a power.

And what use was power if you didn’t use it? Why fixate on five corpses when she’d already stood over hundreds?

(Rika had laughed on the other end of the phone call. “I’m proud of you, daughter,” she had said. It was the first time her mother had ever expressed such a sentiment.)

Tsuna was staring into a cup of hot chocolate when the phone rang. He jumped and then flinched at the sound of shattering porcelain, his hands already aflame.

Reborn just sighed at him. “Go get that, Dame-Tsuna,” he ordered. “I’ll clean up your mess.” As he had been doing for the past — future? — six months.

Tsuna smiled weakly. “Thanks, Reborn.” He hurried to the phone, moving around the spill without thinking about it. He hadn’t tripped in a while. Not a good idea to do that when people were shooting at you, he’d learned that the hard way.

(Reborn didn’t count. He’d known Reborn wouldn’t really hurt him three days into his stay. The Millefiore had no such compunctions.)

It was easier nowadays with his Flames completely unsealed. A lot of things were easier now.

“Hello?” he said even though he already knew who the caller was.

“Greetings, Sawada-san,” Masami greeted. It felt like he hadn’t heard her voice in years. He’d forgotten how softly and delicately she spoke.

Tsuna spared a second to be grateful that the brittle edge Mukuro had left appeared to be gone. “Masami-san! It’s good to hear from you,” he said, and his smile this time was genuine. “I...Kyoya told me you got memories from the future, too?”

There was a beat of silence. Then, “Yes. That me didn’t interact with your group, but I see that this trip has left some lasting changes on everyone.”

He wrinkled his brow. She wasn’t wrong, but… “Ehh? I didn’t say anything?” How did she know?

“You have never before had the courage to call my brother by his given name,” Masami said, dry even through the phone.

Oh. Yeah. That would explain it, wouldn’t it? By his elbow since who-knows-when, Reborn rolled his eyes and smacked Tsuna’s arm. He barely felt it but pouted on principle. Mean. “Y-Yeah, I guess we all got a little closer, huh?”

Odd. Before Masami had pointed it out, Tsuna hadn’t even noticed. It was hard to ponder on things like that when the world was on fire. When Hayato had nearly gotten hit by a bomb (the irony hadn’t been lost on them), he certainly hadn’t been thinking about honorifics when he’d shouted at him to get down right now.

An agreeable hum came down the line. “So you’ve returned triumphant. Now what?”

Tsuna stared at the floor. The hot chocolate was gone as if never was. He would be impressed if he hadn’t seen Reborn vanish a dozen bodies in about five minutes. “I...don’t know, really,” he said quietly. “What else is there? I just want things to go back to normal.”

He was almost expecting Masami to tell him that everything would be okay, everything would go back to what it was. Clearly, their months apart had turned him delusional because she said, gentle and brutal, “You gave up ‘normal’ in exchange for living rather than existing a long time ago, Sawada-san.”

Tsuna closed his eyes. He knew that. It would be nice if he could pretend otherwise sometimes, though. “You’re right,” he admitted. “I can’t leave behind the decisions I made in that timeline.”

“Would you choose differently?”

The answer came without hesitation, filled with the conviction that had been the only thing keeping him going when so many of his people were laying silent and bloody in Medical. “No.” Because if he had, he would have lost his friends. Because if he had, even more people would have died.

Tsuna regretted that he was forced to make those decisions. That the situation had gotten so bad; that people had to put their lives in his 14-year-old hands because his future self had been dying. But if he had to do it all over again, he would still make those same choices.

“Then accept who you are now and move on,” Masami said. There was no mercy in her, only a clarity that was so pristine it hurt. She was like Kyoya in that way, except she spoke truth with words rather than with actions when she could.

He’d missed that. “I’ll try. I’ll — try. Will I be seeing you soon, Masami-san?” Because his Intuition, honed through battles he’d never wanted to fight, knew that he would be seeing her again. It was just a matter of when.

“No,” she replied serenely. “If you need me, send word through the Varia.”

Right. Right. Because she’d been a part of the assassination group in the future. Tsuna had been trying not to think about that. He also didn’t want to think about how that sort of indicated she was — or would be — in contact with them in this life too.

That, despite everything, she would be caught up in this mafia world she had never wanted to touch.

“I will. Please take care, Masami-san,” Tsuna commanded, asked, pleaded. It still felt like every goodbye could be the last. And he didn’t even have a Bond with Masami like he did with his Guardians, she wasn’t always in Namimori or Italy like his other people. If she was in trouble, he’d never know.

He’d never know. If he didn’t know, how could he help?

Tsuna was so tired of being afraid. Of dreading every piece of communication for fear that it’d be another KIA report.

Masami’s response was neutral and smooth, giving no hint of her thoughts. He couldn’t read her like he could Kyoya now, and wasn’t that a strange turn-around? “And you, Sawada-san.”

“Please — call me Tsuna,” he said on a whim, on a bone-deep certainty that this was the right thing to say. “You, of everyone...you deserve to. Etiquette or not...I don’t want you to know me by my father’s name.”

“...as you say, Tsunayoshi-san.”

So far, Masami had been paying for everything with her parents’ money. Rika let this continue for a month before sending her a contract in New Delhi. A thrice-convicted molester and pedophile who had targeted the wrong little girl.

This body had all of the skills that Rika had drilled into it. This mind had all of the skills that had made her Varia Quality.

It was…all too easy, really.

She took a picture of his broken body and turned him into fertilizer. It was more useful to the planet as a whole than he’d been as a human being, she was sure.

Rika opened a bank account for her and deposited her earnings there. From then on, she was expected to be financially independent. Her parents would only pay for her online classes and plane tickets. Everything else was her responsibility.

Masami accepted this decision with grace. It just meant more money for her to spend on weapons and souvenirs now that she didn’t have to mind her parents’ financial restrictions.

In the light drenched city of Seville, she slipped down a cobblestone alley bare minutes before two Varia agents arrived at the plaza she had been people-watching in. Masami was on the train to Rennes an hour later. No doubt they would have had a much easier time actually capturing her if she couldn’t recite the Varia Standard Procedure Handbook Version 26.2 from memory alone even now.

The Future That Never Was

Masami sighed as Xanxus booted another Rain rookie out the window. Today, he wanted beef filet steak apparently. “If you keep this up, we’re going to have to go recruiting again, Boss,” she said. “And you hate having to deal with new recruits.”

Xanxus leaned back in his armchair and propped his feet up on the desk where three different steak dishes had been offered to him and summarily thrown on the ground. He crossed his arms and his legs so it was one of those days then. The excessive moisture in the air was probably aggravating his scars. “I wouldn’t have to if they didn’t put garbage in front of me,” he growled.

Most people thought they hazed their new recruits by assigning them suicide missions. They didn’t. They just had the poor fools deliver dinner to Xanxus instead.

She glanced over another report on ammunition inventory. Between the Officers, Masami and Squalo handled most of the logistics. He took care of outgoing affairs while she handled in-house operations. They were a very efficient team.

“OI! THIS ISN’T THE TIME, YOU SHITTY BOSS!” Squalo chose that moment to shout into her ear. He’d found their unfortunate temporary waiters then. Wincing, Masami turned the volume on her earpiece way down.

Xanxus had taken his out half an hour ago, which meant she was to keep him up to date on any major news. Between Squalo, Leviathan, and Hayato, Masami made it a point to have Lussuria look over her hearing every month.

“The Prince will be killing this peasant,” Belphegor announced. “Find us a new Mist Officer, Signora.”

“Senpai! That hurt!” Fran complained, monotone as usual.

Masami stood up and went over to Xanxus’ alcohol cabinet. She held out bottles of her preferred drinks until he gave a grunt of approval. Then, she poured them both two full glasses and breathed through the homicidal urge.

“Darling,” Lussuria chirped, “Order us some more bandages, would you? These poor dears just won’t stop bleeding.” Cheerful tone aside, it sounded more like a threat to those wounded: start clotting or else.

“Noted.” Masami curled herself gracefully into an armchair and thought longingly of a catnap.

Alas, it was not to be.

“Bel-senpai let some weirdos head towards the base,” Fran reported casually. “There was a weirdo that was just like Bel-senpai so I guess we now have two stabby senpai to deal with.”

“Die, peasant.”

“Senpai, if you don’t stop throwing knives at me, I’ll start thinking you don’t like me.”

Masami ignored the possible murder happening through her earpiece and looked at Xanxus. “Incoming from the East,” she said.

Xanxus hmphed and drank his wine. “Trash.”

Her eyes drifted to the east-facing window. She could sense them already. Rain Flames, a lot of it. Was that...an elephant!?

Masami thought of the amount of recruiting they would have to do if the wounded Lussuria was looking after were killed. Then, she sighed again and pressed the brightly glowing ring on her index finger against her Cloud Box.

Two months later, a barista in an average Italian coffee shop was wiping the countertop when the bell rang. A pretty Asian teenager stepped in, her black hair in a bun and her lace sundress all white. Her smile was sweet.

“Good morning!” he said cheerfully. “What can I get you?” If she didn’t show any sign of understanding, he was ready to switch to English or Spanish. He didn’t know a word of the Eastern Asian languages, though.

To his relief, she didn’t miss a beat before replying in smooth, lightly accented Italian, “Orange juice and a croissant, please.”

“Coming right up!”

After paying for the order, she headed over to a table by the windows and took a seat. In the early sunlight, her elegant posture and peaceful expression made her look like a Renaissance painting of some sort.

The barista smiled to himself and continued with his work.

An hour later, she was still there, her drink half-finished. A book had appeared in her hands, and she seemed content where she was. He wondered if she was waiting for someone or simply someone who enjoyed reading in coffee shops.

Half an hour passed by. And the next time he glanced at her, she wasn’t alone anymore.

“You led my men on a wild goose chase for weeks,” Xanxus said casually as he sat across from Masami. “They came back with their tails between their fucking legs.”

She carefully bookmarked her place and shut her book. Pity, she had been in the middle of Napoleon’s fall from grace. “Greetings. That seems more like a failing on their part.”

He grinned, and it was vicious without any pretense of the societal niceties that so many liked to use to pander. That was the thing with Xanxus di Vongola, he didn’t even try to pretend like he wasn’t a top-tier predator. “Yeah, the shark threw them into remedial training with Bel. Trash who aren’t Quality don’t deserve to stay in the Varia.”

Masami met his gaze without hesitation. “Then why are you here, Signore Xanxus?”

He scoffed and leaned back. Arms crossed, Xanxus lounged on the wooden cafe chair like it was that plush armchair-throne of his. “Don’t play dumb, it doesn’t suit you. You wouldn’t talk to any of my subordinates. That’s why I’m here.”

He was absolutely right, of course. If he hadn’t shown up within another hour, she would have been on a flight to New York City without looking back. She refused to even consider a leader who didn’t give her the respect of an in-person pitch, future-her decisions or not. The only reason she was in Italy at all was...a morbid sort of curiosity about the organization, the Sky, who had managed to convince another version of her to stay.

That, and she was tired of her tails.

Masami considered Xanxus. She knew Tsunayoshi had fought and beaten him once; that it had been bloody and painful and filled with familial betrayal that had disgusted Kyoya. She knew Tsunayoshi respected-sympathized-cared for him in his unique Tsunayoshi-way. She knew that in the future-that-wasn't-to-come that they'd settled into a somewhat stable professional relationship eventually, that they'd been Family in the end. 

All her Flames told her was SkySkySky. All she felt was power and ferocity. All she saw was a rage that could burn down the world.

He felt…warm. Warm after the ice that had sunken into her veins after her encounter with Mukuro, warm after the chilly brilliance that had settled in her claws after being dipped in blood. She didn’t trust it, and so she instinctively shied away from it.

Sometimes, it was better to be cold.

“Why?” Masami asked, and it was a deceptively simple challenge. Why should she give him a chance? Why shouldn’t she take that plane to New York City? Why should she stake her freedom on a possibility? Why not bury these memories and continue walking their separate paths?

Xanxus shrugged. “Fuck if I know. That’s on you. I don’t have to prove shit.”

…of course. It was the only answer she would have accepted. Anyone who went around announcing their power didn’t have any. If there was a tinge of disappointment, well, Masami ignored it. “In that case, what would you like to talk about then?” she replied blandly. “I’m assuming you didn’t go through all this trouble just to have coffee with me.”

“Heh, fuck no. Quality is Quality,” Xanxus said. “Future, present, past — that all means shit to me. If you’re Quality, I want you in the Varia. And from what I can remember, you made a decent Officer, too. I’d be a fool to pass up on that.”

“That’s me with ten years more experience,” Masami pointed out. “Even if I will be Quality, that doesn’t mean I qualify right now.”

Xanxus raised an eyebrow. “Yeah? You evaded my people for months on end without fucking up once. We both know you could beat half the lower-ranked trash today without breaking a sweat. How many languages can you speak?”

She thought about it. Everything was a bit jumbled, present experience and future knowledge all mixed together. She could speak Japanese, Spanish, Italian, and English fluently. Her Russian, Hindi, Chinese, and French weren’t quite there yet.

“Four,” Masami said.

“Bullshit.”

“Four fluently,” she amended. “Four passably.”

Xanxus snorted. “Like I said. Quality.”

“What can you offer that I don’t already have?”

“Partners that can pull their own weight, backup, medical care, training, weapons, and missions that don’t bore the fuck out of you.” Xanxus ticked each point off on his fingers. “Plus, the old man doesn’t get mission reports. I do. So if you want to wander off for a week in New York City, no one will give a shit and you’ll still get paid.” He glanced at his seven raised fingers. “Did I miss anything? Oh, yeah, and a retirement plan. Not that most scum ever get to use it.” Judging by the open scorn, Xanxus didn’t think much of Vongola’s benefits package.

“That's about as much as you’re going to get,” he concluded with a bored look. “Take it or leave it.”

Masami drank her orange juice while she thought. When the glass was empty, she placed it down and said, “A six month contract, voidable by both parties at any time, terms to be negotiated.”

Xanxus’s smirk was a dark, satisfied thing. “Come on then, time to go talk to the shark.”

The Future That Never Was

“How are they settling in?”

Lal Mirch scoffed. “How do you think? They’re seven baby civilians thrown head-first into a Mafia Territorial War. There’s been so much fucking crying, it’s like I’m trying to run a nursery.”

Well. She hadn’t expected anything more to be honest. “They understand what’s at stake?”

“From the way that kid Storm yelled and ranted, I would say so, yeah.”

“They don't need to be ready for the front lines.” That was her job. “They just need to be able to survive for three months.” And then they could bring their time’s Tsunayoshi back.

“We’re trying,” Lal Mirch said. “But I can’t make any promises. They’ve already encountered one Funeral Wreath and barely escaped from that one alive.”

“Do you need reinforcements?”

Lal Mirch’s voice was bitterly amused. “Can you spare any?”

No. Not really. They were already stretched too thin trying to hold Italy — but she would give a call to Tetsuya anyway. He was the only one Kyoya might listen to.

She would talk to her brother herself, but unfortunately, he'd already broken his sixth phone of the month in herbivore-related frustration.

The Varia Compound was exactly where and how she remembered it. She didn’t doubt that the two members on guard duty would have tried to kill her if Xanxus wasn’t leading the way. Granted, they wouldn’t have succeeded, but it was the attempt that mattered. Probably.

“Boss.” They nodded in acknowledgment, and Xanxus gave a grunt in response. As Masami walked past, she could feel their eyes on her.

The guards weren’t the only ones. On their way up to the fourth floor, which was where the Officers’ rooms were, there were suspiciously few people in the hallways and a whole lot of stares boring into her back from the shadows. Masami noted them and then dismissed them in the same breath.

Dangerous, yes. Everyone within this Compound was dangerous. However, any attack on her person now would be an insult to Xanxus, and no one would risk that.

There were a few blood stains missing from the third floor stairs. She wasn’t sure how she felt about that.

Xanxus snapped at a wayward member to call the Officers and shoved his way into his office. He took his seat behind the large desk teeming with papers. Masami eyed the stacks and wondered if she should back out now. She did not miss the paperwork.

“Don’t even think about it, trash,” Xanxus said with a glare.

Masami let her tessen slide into her hand with a flick of her wrist and snapped it open to fan herself. She smiled innocently as if she had no idea what Xanxus was talking about. His expression made it clear that he wasn’t fooled.

She sat down in one of the armchairs and arranged her dress about her properly. First (nth) impressions were important, after all.

Squalo was, unsurprisingly, the first one in. His office was right next door. “You!” he snapped as soon as he saw Masami. “It’s about time! The junior agents’ complaints were giving me a headache. And the paperwork!”

She arched an eyebrow and said politely, “My apologies for your misfortune, Signore Squalo.”

He bared his teeth at her and flopped down on the couch across her, arms crossed.

Lussuria was next. He beamed when he saw her and said, “Oh, I just knew you’d come around eventually! Love your dress, darling, we simply must go shopping together one of these days.”

Masami smiled and wondered how Kyoko, Hana, and Haru were doing. Those innocent times of shopping and bakeries felt like another life altogether. In ten years, they might be a valuable part of Tsunayoshi’s “legitimate” operations but for now, they were all safely in school. “I’d be delighted.”

A few minutes later, Belphegor waltzed in, Mammon floating over his shoulder. He smirked, eyes lighting up with dark glee. “If it isn’t the little lady! You’ve given me quite the new toys to play with. They screamed beautifully.”

Ah. Him, she knew how to deal with. Masami rose and swept into the most gracious curtsy, fan held open. She said, sugar-sweet, “Greetings to your Royal Highness.”

Belphegor smirked back at her, all teeth, and gave a mocking imitation of a bow back. Mammon said nothing, appearing uninterested in this whole situation. They settled against the far wall, Belphegor slipping out a few knives to play with idly.

Leviathan was the last in, and he scowled as soon as he caught sight of her. “You’ve got some nerve, making the Boss wait on you.”

It was like dealing with Hayato all over again. “I’ll be sure to keep that in mind next time,” she said lightly, dipping her head in a greeting more obviously sardonic than usual. Belphegor broke out in a fit of giggles while Leviathan spluttered until Xanxus glared at him.

“Shut the door, trash.”

The door shut with a loud bang from the force of Leviathan’s kick, and Masami was trapped with six of the most lethal individuals on this continent. She suspected any other person in her position would be scared witless.

She searched within herself and found nothing more than a distant, nebulous curiosity as to where this would go. These days, she didn’t even know where her limits were; they seemed to stretch horizon to horizon. The moment she’d eventually find one was guaranteed to be nasty.

All eyes turned to Xanxus. He didn’t waste any time getting down to business. “She’s Varia for the next six months,” he said. “We’ll see how she does and then we’ll talk about promotions.”

No one seemed surprised but then, she hadn’t even been surprised herself. Lussuria twittered, hands pressed to his cheeks, while Belphegor and Mammon looked as idly bored as ever. Leviathan looked like he’d bitten into a lemon.

Squalo frowned thoughtfully. “We going to put her through any of the tests, Boss? There’ll be questions that we don’t want to answer if we don’t.”

Xanxus turned piercing crimson eyes on Masami. She stared back calmly until his lips curled into a cold smirk. “Spread the word that tomorrow’s open season on her. Whoever wins gets the right to complain. Everyone else can get lost.”

This, she was familiar with. Kyoya’s Disciplinary Committee ran the same way. If there was an active Cloud Officer, then she’d be expected to defeat (or kill, more often than not) them to take the position. But there wasn’t, so the whole of Varia would have to do.

“Ushishishi, you think you can handle that, Signorina?” Belphegor taunted, ever the one to play with his food.

Masami snapped her fan closed and mused absently, “I guess we’ll find out, won’t we?”

(She had clashed with Gesso Byakuran himself once and came out alive. Everyone in that room knew that her strength wasn’t in question.)

The Future That Never Was

On the west side of the Vongola Mansion was a courtyard that doubled as a lovingly tended Japanese garden. In the center was a koi pond, cared for by the mansion servants and the occasional admirer. During spring, the blooming azaleas and apricot blossoms turned the ground into a work of art. Oddly enough, for a Japanese-styled garden, there were no sakura trees planted anywhere.

It was a gift from the Vongola Decimo to his Cloud Guardian and his sister. Occasionally, the Decimo even came to relax in the garden himself, and for all that entire wings of the mansion were regularly destroyed by the many powerful and...eccentric residents, this place was strictly off-limits.

The one time a guest from an allied Family had set a shrub on fire by accident, he had escaped death by tonfa by a mere hair’s breadth, only to come face to face with the Vongola Decimo’s disappointment, which wasn’t actually much better of a fate.

Needless to say, no one had so much as made a flower fall from there on.

It was here where Takeshi found her after all was said and done. He sat next to her on the bench that overlooked the pond, and they watched the koi swim about aimlessly for long minutes. When he spoke, it was to ask, “How are you?”

Masami considered. There had been a bullet-sized hole that had gone clean through her right shoulder a bare three days ago. She was already regaining her mobility and would be cleared for missions within the week thanks to Lussuria, but she knew that wasn’t what he was asking.

“It’s over,” she said instead, and she would thank her mother for giving her such a cold, clear lens with which to view the world and her decisions since childhood but her mother was dead. “At this point, that’s all that matters.”

Gesso Byakuran was dead. The Millefiore Family was no more. What she wanted had come to pass and if the means didn’t quite justify the ends — well, it was already done and there was no point in looking back.

(She felt that once she had been softer, kinder than the woman she was today. But again, those were regrets that were now useless to her, and she had long since vowed to walk forward unburdened.)

Takeshi blew out a breath and leaned back on his hands. The smile that tilted his lips was wry. “It’s over,” he agreed. And then, “Tsuna’s awake.”

“...Is he now.”

Masami stood in the middle of a training room. Last night, she had slept well in the suite traditionally reserved for the Cloud Officer. Lussuria had snickered as he had shown her the way, both of them well aware she'd known exactly where it was. Housekeeping had already cleaned it up for her, but the furnishings were still European-style and lacked the comforting touches that her memory insisted it should have. How odd, for something to be so familiar and yet unfamiliar all at once.

There had been shadows watching her every step since she had set foot outside of that suite this morning. Now, those shadows lined the walls, watching, waiting. If there was skepticism based on her appearance, it was edged with wariness. The Varia knew better than to be fooled by appearances. That she, a stranger, had been backed by the Executive Officers? Been brought in by the Boss himself? It spoke more than the flowers in her hair and the dainty grace with what she moved.

Squalo had become the Varia Head at her age, after all.

What a nice ball they had arranged to welcome her. If that was the case…then she mustn’t disappoint them by being a bad dance partner.

Her first contender had three scars across his face and two daggers in his hands. He was fast, and he was strong, and Lightning sparked off his blades. Masami swept him off his feet with a flick of her wrist and had her tessen at his throat within the first thirty seconds.

Off to the side, Belphegor laughed.

Varia Assassins, Masami knew, all had different styles of combat but one point of similarity: each and every one of them would go straight for her vital points without hesitation. What else could you expect from an assassin? She was the same, although she couldn’t recall when that change had occurred. Pity that she was stronger, faster, and colder than any of her dance partners could be.

Her challengers came in waves as word spread. The Officers came and watched in shifts, mostly, she suspected, for their own amusement. At noon, Lussuria swept in and shooed everyone away. “You can come back after lunch,” he said, cheerful but firm.

Masami smiled and dipped her head in gratitude. She had a bruise on her left leg, a scabbed-over cut on her collarbone, and two bloodied fans. She let Lussuria fuss over her and bring her lunch, amused that he really was just as exuberant and energetic as she remembered.

If the food in Lussuria’s hands briefly glowed with Sun Flames before it was handed to her, she politely pretended not to notice. Poison was only to be expected, really, although she pitied the stupid fool who had tried to sneak in poison right under Lussuria’s nose. From the too-bright smile on his face, someone’s bones were going to get broken by nightfall today. They clearly hadn’t thought things through; they should have tried their luck with breakfast instead.

The afternoon ball was a tad more strenuous, if only because she was tiring. As the sun sank, Xanxus himself stepped in and watched her dance with an unreadable expression, leaning against a wall with his arms crossed. A tiger at rest, red eyes more than a match to the sunset that painted the world in wide brushstrokes outside the window. The small crowd she had gathered, both to watch and to challenge, gave him space but the respect in their eyes was open, as nothing else about these assassins were.

He was the Varia's uncontested Sky, and it showed.

Masami blocked a strike that would have sliced her head right off of her neck with the spine of her gunsen, arm aching as the impact was absorbed. This dance started more than five minutes ago. It was time it ended.

A second of concentration, a flare of Cloud Flames throughout her body, and Masami was behind her opponent’s back faster than the eye could follow. Her tessen rested almost gently against her nape.

The Storm yielded with a bow of her head and an intrigued spark in her eyes.

Of everything, enhancing her own body with Flame had been the easiest to master. Clouds were feared even in the Mafia for this exact reason: Propogation with her level and purity of Flame meant that as long as she had enough Will, it was very difficult to put her down permanently. Suns could heal, Mists could confuse, and Storms could destroy, but that all meant nothing if they couldn't last.

Masami eviscerated two more challengers before Xanxus pushed himself off the wall. The room quieted at once, the blue-haired, tattooed man who had stepped out towards Masami quickly backtracking into the crowd once more. Smart.

“Time’s up,” he said. “Get back to work, you pieces of trash. You, go see Squalo for the paperwork.”

The Future That Never Was

“Masami?”

“Yes?”

“Do you think I’m doing the right thing?”

“...isn’t it a bit late to ask that question?”

A weak laugh. “I know it is, but I need to ask anyway.”

“I think we left right and wrong behind us a long time ago, Tsunayoshi.”

“That’s not exactly what I wanted for us.”

“Regardless, that’s where we’re at.”

His sigh echoed over the line. “Will I see you this Thursday?”

Once a month, the Varia Officers met with the Vongola Decimo and some of his Guardians. Masami was out of the country more often than not during these meetings but — “Yes. I’ll be there.” There were some issues they had to discuss after all.

“Oh, look at you!” Lussuria squealed, unable to help himself. “You were born for this uniform, darling.”

Their newest Varia member stared at her reflection in silence. Her expression was as neutral as ever, but he knew he had outdone himself this time.

Drawing on his faint memories of that peculiar almost-future, Lussuria had commissioned Masami a lovely black floor-length coat, the collar edged with luxurious white fur and the inside a gentle cream richly embroidered with the purple wisteria flowers that she seemed to prefer on her kanzashi. The fasteners on the front were, of course, also shaped like wisteria flowers. Lussuria didn’t do anything by halves, much less fashion.

Paired with her heeled black boots and knee-length rich blue yukata, Masami looked like a dream. So pretty! So innocent! So deceptively soft and sweet!

He was so proud of himself.

“I also got you a shorter jacket and a dress made with the same motif and of the same material,” Lussuria added helpfully.

Masami ran a hand down her new cloak and hummed in approval. “It’s beautiful,” she said in that angelic voice. Her smile when it came was luminous, and oh yes, he could see how someone could mistake her for harmless. “My thanks, Signore Lussuria.”

He waved that off. “My pleasure, hon. You’re one of us now, after all.”

Lussuria watched an icy edge slip into those innocent dove grey eyes at the casual claim and wondered how exactly the Boss was planning to catch this wandering Cloud. She didn’t seem the type to go willingly, and there was no point in trying to chain down a Cloud.

Every disastrous attempt to do that Lussuria had been witness to had ended in a homicide. Or five.

And, of course, she just had to be a Misty Cloud, the most volatile combination of Flame possible. Leave it to Xanxus to reject all of the nice, socialized, Mafia-born Clouds that the Nono had presented to him year after year in favor of this little girl from a middle-of-nowhere Japanese town with unmistakable ties to the future Decimo, the lineage of one of the most unpredictable and independent Clans around, and an already firmly-ingrained mental block against Sky Harmony.

It was very in-character of him though. Even the so-called nicest and most welcoming Skies that Lussuria had met were all secretly and ruthlessly selective in their choice of Guardian Elements, whether they were consciously aware of that or not. A strong Sky could bring a small Family of Flame-Actives under their protection but their Inner Court of Elements always stayed six at most. Having two people share a Guardian position was, after all, the surest recipe for catastrophe and in-fighting.

Sawada Tsunayoshi was the odd case out, with some sort of weird body-sharing between his two Mist Guardians that somehow made it possible.

Far-reaching and encompassing Sky that he might be, Xanxus di Vongola had Wrath in his blood and would never accept just anyone as his own. It was what made him such a good Varia Boss, no one but Quality could possibly meet his standards and no amount of crying or whining would change that. It’d be much more likely to result in a bullet to the head.

Someone like the future Decimo, who, from Mammon’s reports, accepted random strangers into his little group every other week, would have only destroyed the Varia by accepting subpar riff-raff that would have dragged the actual Quality members down to their graves.

From Squalo, whose obsessive devotion led to him cutting his own hand off, to Belphegor, who came to them all of eight years old and covered in his own family’s blood, none of the Boss’ current Guardians were conventional and particularly Nono-approved. Lussuria himself had initially been laughed out of the Main House for his preferences and way of presenting himself. Boss hadn't cared, as long as they were his, and that was why they followed him.

Of course the Boss’ chosen Cloud Guardian would hardly be the exception to the rule.

The Future That Never Was

For all that she enjoyed dancing and her version of balls, Masami found actual formal balls quite boring. Even a Vongola-styled celebration — or perhaps, especially a Vongola-styled celebration — for Vongola Decimo’s miraculous survival (revival?) was nothing more than a waste of her time.

You would think that Mafioso would know how to dance. And most of them did…technically…know the three most basic steps of the standard ballroom dances. Pathetic. Very few people were anywhere near Masami’s match.

“Herbivores,” Kyoya hissed in utter disdain when she joined him.

Masami snapped her tessen open in agreement and peered at the crowd over it.

The vast majority of the people here were from allied Families, come to pay their respects to the ones who had toppled Millefiore at last, even if they didn’t know that the key players had been ten years younger at the time. Dino of Cavallone was talking to Squalo and Takeshi a few meters to the right from Tsunayoshi. Uni of Giglio Nero was surrounded by the recovered Arcobaleno, to her bodyguard’s visible dismay.

The others were Families who had come to throw themselves to their knees in front of Tsunayoshi and beg to ally with them, hoping to leech off of their newfound strength and fame. That or to poke “subtly” around for potential weaknesses to exploit while Vongola was still recovering. Some of the truly incompetent and overconfident Family Heads were trying to do both at the same time.

Remarkable, really, how lacking in self-awareness some people could be.

Kyoya and Masami were observing the scene from the west-facing wall, safely away from both the entrances and the buffet table. They made an intimidating pair, the Hibari Siblings, the brother in a classic black suit and the sister in a floor-length purple gown. Both tall, pale, and beautiful, radiating an unmistakable air of aloof danger and elegance.

First-time attendees could only sneak discrete glances at them, whispering to themselves of the various rumors that surrounded the two. Hibari Kyoya was well-known as the Vongola Cloud Guardian, strictly antisocial and uninterested in any offers. Apparently, the last two young socialites who had come up to him to try their luck had ended up in the hospital when they didn’t heed his warnings to “stop crowding, herbivore”.

Hibari Masami, on the other hand, seemed to be the second-most sought after lady in the ballroom, with the first being the Vongola Mist Guardian, Dokuro Chrome. Unfortunately for all of the hopeful suitors present, both were terribly difficult to approach thanks to their protective brothers.

When Masami wasn’t lingering by her brother’s side, she was polite and diplomatic with those who successfully caught her in conversation but refused all offers to dance and always smoothly detached herself within the first ten minutes. The only people anyone had ever seen her genuinely talk to and dance with were the Vongola Decimo and his Guardians, her Boss and her fellow Varia Officers, and occasionally the Arcobaleno.

Of course, any attempts to “persuade” Chrome or Masami were first subject to said lady’s displeasure, then their brother’s, and then their Boss’. Without even getting into the folly of provoking a possessive Sky by trying to poach one of their Guardians, the Vongola Decimo and the Varia Boss were not enemies you wanted to have.

Veteran attendees of Vongola Balls knew better than to even glance at the bored-looking Hibari Siblings for fear of catching their attention. They had been witness to enough altercations to know that a sure-fire way for the Clouds to dispel their boredom was with fights with misbehaving guests…

Well. Rather than fights, one-sided beatdowns was probably the more accurate description.

Although many considered him close to a saint in the Mafia, with more converts than ever after the defeat of the Millefiore, the Vongola Decimo had a worrying history of only holding back his Cloud Guardian once his chosen victim(s) needed to be carted off to the hospital.

The less said about the Varia Boss’ lack of reaction, the better.

Her first mission was, as promised, in New York City, with Belphegor. “To show her the ropes” was the official reason given, and Masami smiled and accepted it at face value. Belphegor wasn’t the worst watcher in the Varia. At least it wasn’t Leviathan.

“You really are like one of the ladies at court,” Belphegor commented on the Varia’s private plane as they set off.

Masami glanced up from her embroidery hoop even as her fingers continued their work on the field of spider lilies. “Does it bother your Highness?” she asked, curious. The details eluded her, but she knew that his Royal Childhood hadn’t been pleasant.

Belphegor scoffed. “As if you could. I just don’t see why a little village girl like you needs to know these things.”

She hummed, re-threading her needle with red thread. “Precision and patience make beauty.” It was a quote Rika was fond of. Such was needlework; such was art.

Belphegor’s grin was all teeth. “That, I can agree with.”

Masami was well aware that Belphegor’s beauty was probably more along the lines of razor-sharp wires and bloodied bodies than embroidery. She wondered if she was supposed to be more disturbed by that than she was.

(Their mission was completed flawlessly, with not a single misstep from start to finish. Afterwards, Belphegor accompanied her to the Fabric District, where he relentlessly critiqued everything that didn’t meet with his Royal Standards and scared quite a few new employees.

Veteran New York customer service representatives, Masami suspected, couldn’t be scared by anything on this plane of existence.)

The Future That Never Was

Lupo di nuvola was what they had said when they had handed her the Cloud Box for the first time. A wolf of Cloud, silver fur gleaming and glossy, pale clear eyes patient and watching. A loyal companion, albeit one with a bit of a loner’s spirit.

What a long name to call out in combat, Masami had thought. She would call her Box Animal ‘Fuji’ instead, for the wisteria flowers that she wore in her hair and had embroidered on the hems of her clothes.

“You named your Box Animal after a mountain?” Fran asked when he first heard, thoughtless as usual. Sometimes, she wondered what went on in his head before inevitably deciding she really didn’t want to know.

She could tell him that the wisteria featured prominently in the Hibari Kamon, both to symbolize the longevity, honor, and strength of their lineage and to warn outsiders to step lightly about them for no part of the beautiful plant was not poisonous.

She could tell him that, with a devastating amount of the strong and rebellious but decentralized Hibari Clan killed off by the Millefiore, it was only right that she pay the right homage to those of her blood caught unfairly in the crossfire.

She could tell him that it had been her mother’s favorite flower because it had been her father’s favorite to gift, had been their wedding bouquet, and that the gold-tipped wisteria kanzashi she currently wore in her hair had been all that her parents had left her in the end.

(Their land in Namimori, what was left of the family manor, the remaining clan responsibilities — those had all been left to Kyoya. Harsh though it might seem, never let it be said that Hibari Satoshi and Hibari Rika had not understood their children.)

In the end, Masami only smiled. “It is a beautiful mountain, no?”

Fran stared blankly at her. "Are you sure you shouldn't be in my position? You seem Misty enough to me."

"I'll be nice and overlook that this once."

The day after Masami returned to the Compound, Squalo tracked her down in a hallway and shoved a heavy stack of paperwork into her hands.

“...I’m not the Cloud Officer,” she reminded pointedly, not really expecting the obligatory protest to make a difference.

He waved a dismissive hand, already turning on his heel to leave, curtain of silver hair whipping about behind him. “Tough shit. You’re still the highest-ranking Cloud agent we have now, so this is all yours. Boss wants it done by the end of the week.”

And that was that, apparently.

What an interesting definition of probation they had around here.

Rolling her eyes, Masami swept into the Cloud Officer’s designated office. If they were making her do the work and giving her the suite, then she might as well usurp the office, too. She’d had the best natural lighting in the entire Compound.

Well. In ten year’s time, at least. Right now, the whole place was covered in dust and cobwebs.

(She knew what they were doing. Routine was a trap, especially when it came with responsibilities and duties. It was a rabbit hole she had already fallen down once with Tsunayoshi and his people. Six months of discounted labor was also a bonus, no doubt.)

Masami surveyed the disaster and promptly went off to find Lussuria. He’d help her make the rookies clean up this mess and probably give some interior decorating tips while he was at it.

The knock that sounded on Xanxus’ office door was light but firm, loud enough to be heard but soft enough to permit the occupant to be undisturbed if so desired.

Xanxus knew all of his people. Even the ones who hadn’t quite settled under his Sky yet.

He set his pen aside and braced his chin on his knuckles. “Come in.”

Hibari Masami stepped in with a stack of paperwork held in the crook of her arm and a polite smile. She inclined her head slightly, saying, “Greetings. Next month’s guard shifts, squad provisions, and requested acquisitions, as...bequeathed to me by Signor Squalo two days ago.”

As expected of her. In one unassuming statement, she had neatly sidestepped choosing a term of address for him and therefore acknowledging or disrespecting his authority over her, conveyed her displeasure but efficiency with regards to the given task, and shifted the onus of responsibility back onto Squalo.

Xanxus nodded and held out his hand. The flawlessly aligned stack of crisp papers was delivered to him, followed by a small step back and a graceful courtesy that even a mafioso governess would approve of. “If there’s nothing else, please excuse me.” Her footsteps were dainty but silent and efficient on her way out, not a single second spent longer in his office than necessary.

Once the door closed behind her, he flipped absently through the stack of papers. It was perfectly completed, with not a single smudge, misspelling, or illegible line to be found, which was more than what he could say for Bel’s blood-stained reports or Lussuria’s doctor handwriting.

Was it any wonder that Squalo had gleefully exploited the opportunity to offload some of his work onto her?

Bright, sharp, intelligent. Strong enough to command the Cloud Division, dependable enough to entrust the inner workings of the Varia to, bold enough to challenge an Executive Officer, even Xanxus himself, if she disagreed with a decision. Just broken enough that even without reaching with his Sky, he could feel the almost Discordant twist in her Flames, the result of a Cloud's chosen Territory being nearly rejected by the Cloud itself, being slowly unwound through pure strength of Will.

She really was well suited to the position.

In the privacy of his office, Xanxus sighed and closed his eyes, leaning his head back against his chair. It had been years since he’d had to court an Element, and it just figured out that the most compatible Cloud he’d ever met was fighting him tooth and nail. Refusing all Flame contact, not remaining in his presence long enough for Sky Attraction to settle in, and actively roaming outside of his Territory.

In the sharp shadows that the sinking sunset cast across his office, the grin that spread across Xanxus’ face was all gleaming teeth, not unlike Bester when he spied a plate of premium beef steak left unattended by the chefs.

Good. Good. That meant he’d made the right choice.

There were six main Divisions within the Varia: one for each Flame type barring Sky. Smaller intra-Division teams in charge of information-gathering, infiltration, subterfuge, and the like also existed but were considered a separate matter entirely. Numbers within each Division varied, with the Cloud Division being the smallest and the Rain Division the largest, with only a small margin over the Storm Division.

(Within all of Varia, there was only one other Sky other than Xanxus himself, and she hid within the Sun Division for her own reasons.

The Officers had let her be. She was Quality and thus worthy of joining the Varia. Certainly, the Main House didn’t need or want to know of such internal Varia workings.

Masami had only vague impressions of her, from that not-future. Isaia had ghosted around with eyes of dull burnt orange, a presence quieter than Tsunayoshi’s had ever been. This was a Sky that had curved in around itself, refusing all visitors, an empty globe with no openings.

It was unlikely that she would ever Harmonize with anyone. A candle could outshine the Flame she called up. Though Tsunayoshi would never understand, Masami understood that letting her bury herself in the shadows of Varia was their own twisted version of mercy.)

Regardless of Division, Xanxus was everyone’s undisputed Boss. Within each Division, there were the new recruits, the regular agents, one or two Squad Leaders, and then the Executive Officer.

Not all agents within a Division were Flame-Active. Someone under Levi’s command was probably Lightning-aligned but not necessarily. However dubious the ethics of the Varia might be, their only criteria for joining was Quality. Which, while a nebulous concept, included nothing of age, gender, race, or Flame Type. It was simply that there were a very small number of Flame-Inactive individuals who could and had joined the Varia and had the skill to remain in the Varia. After the usual trial period, they decided for themselves which Division to join, and that was that.

Which was all to say that the Cloud Division, long since neglected with no Executive Officer and notorious for spawning the most uncooperative assassins within the entire organization, had only seven members.

All of them were Flame-Active (because no Flame-Inactive member had wanted to touch this Division with a ten meter pole), two had joined within the past year, and there wasn’t a single Squad Leader whatsoever because leadership had turned into a decade-old urban myth. Before it had been merrily dumped on Masami, management of the Cloud Division had been a game of hot potato amongst the Executive Officers, which certainly hadn’t helped the situation.

From statistics alone, within the past decade of Varia operations, Clouds had died 20% faster than their cohorts. Now, the only people left were the ones too stubborn to be killed off or quit. It certainly didn’t help their numbers that Clouds were the second rarest Flame Type after Skies.

All in all, there was a lot of work for Masami to do, which…she wasn’t sure how to feel about quite yet. On one hand, she wouldn’t be bored, she was rightfully confident in her ability to excel in this role, and she had fond almost-memories of working with these individuals.

On the other hand, there was a reason she hadn’t agreed to be the Cloud Executive Officer right off the bat and the thought of being weighed down with responsibilities as she’d had at Namimori Middle School made her restless on principle. The only reason she hadn't already run for the hills was because an Officer might lead the Division but that was part administration and part training. Life or death was ultimately up to the individual agent's Quality.

The Varia didn't believe in hand-holding or platitudes. If you died out in the field, then you weren't good enough. That was all there was to it. These people were not her burden to carry and no one would think to ask it of her. Everyone in the Compound had accepted being held accountable for their own actions when they joined, and they'd clean up their own messes or drown in them. It certainly wasn't up to Masami to throw out life jackets to agents Stupid enough to get in over their heads.

Masami idly flipped open the first personnel file on her desk and found a familiar face staring up at her. Well, she thought, at least her second-in-command was already here.

Beelzebul, second most senior agent of the Varia Cloud Division, strode into the Cloud Officer’s office and presented himself with neither fanfare nor courtesy. The place itself was much transformed from when he had seen it last, the curtains open and a bright purple orchid sitting on the windowsill, no cobwebs in sight.

The young girl sitting behind the grand antique wooden table, looking comically small and out of place, was the greatest change.

Beelzebul studied Masami Hibari, the younger sister of the Vongola Decimo’s Cloud Guardian and the Boss’ Cloud Officer in all-but-name, without pretense. She was a pretty little thing who didn’t even have the decency to give off a clearly dangerous air, as Storm Officer Belphegor had when he was still a child giggling with his knives.

No, if he didn’t know better, he would have thought her an ordinary civilian, attending the middle school two blocks down from the grocery market.

But Beelzebul had been in this business for over a decade, had been in the Varia for eight of those twelve years. His discerning eyes quickly caught on the too-sharp hairpins, too-sharp fan, too-sharp gaze. If she was offended by his open evaluation, she didn’t show it, her small smile sweet like the pastries he’d had for breakfast today. He had nothing to say against her joining the Varia. He had been watching the day of her initialization, had witnessed her strength.

But, though Beelzebul trusted the Boss’ judgment, he wondered whether she was truly fit to be the leader of the Cloud Division. Strength did not always correlate with leadership, after all. Theirs was a headstrong, independent bunch who mostly operated solo and sometimes bucked against even Commander Squalo’s orders.

When she had been ushered in with the clear intent of filling the Cloud Officer role, they had wasted no time doing their research. Everyone in the Varia had, as was custom — there was no such thing as paranoia amongst assassins — but he and the other Cloud members had dug deeper than the rest, deeper than usual. In their world, a single misjudgment was the difference between life and death, success and failure, and they would have done the same for any Cloud Officer candidate.

What had they found? Nothing. A normal mafia-free childhood in Namimori, Japan, a brief association with the Vongola Decimo and his Guardians, and a paltry few months of minor assassination work. Not even the high-difficulty ones that the Varia accepted but something even a baby hitman could accomplish with some instruction. Baffled, they had dug further. Surely that couldn’t be it. Surely there was something they were missing. Where was the Quality?

They had even asked one of the Mists for help for fuck’s sake and the Mists were bastards on a good day.

Nothing. Nothing, nothing, nothing. Not a single thing that could justify her position as Cloud Officer. Were they really meant to feel comfortable with their lives in her soft, clean hands? She was still supposedly on "probation" and hadn't even been Named yet. What made her so suited to be Officer when the position had been open for a decade after Ottavio, that traitorous bastard, had finally kicked the bucket?

Hala, fresh from a mission in Egypt and vicious with it, had already suggested ten ways to bully her out of the Compound by the end of the week.

Ugh, just thinking about all of this was making him annoyed.

Masami broke the silence first. “Greetings,” she said with the smallest dip of her head, the trailing ends of her long black hair brushing over the surface of the closed folders on her desk.

“Well met,” Beelzebul answered shortly. “Why am I here?”

Her smile only widened, and for some reason, he felt a rare shiver go down his spine. “We have a mission.”

When first teaching her about the Dying Will Flames of the Sky a little more than a year ago, Santoshi had told her, “Clouds are often characterized as detached and erratic, prone to disobeying authority and difficult to control, especially when not Harmonized with a Sky. However, we of the Hibari Clan, with Cloud and Storm strong in our blood, know differently.”

“How so, Otou-san?”

“In our experience, Clouds lean more towards territorial and possessive. While young and developing, Clouds like to claim something as their own, whether that be land, object, creature, or concept, and set their own rules on the claimed ‘Territory’, which may or may not be understandable to others.

When their rules clash with another’s, as is often the case with other forces of authority, Clouds are then prone to vehement objection with little room for compromise or discussion. In the Mafia, this rejection is often violent, hence the developed reputation. Unfortunately, the more powerful a Flame User, the stronger their natural instincts, so a powerful Cloud’s forceful response can be…considerable.

Typically, however, so long as one does not interfere with a Cloud’s Territory, the Cloud will have minimal interest in the subject matter and can be reasoned with just as much as the next person.”

The stereotype of erratic, Masami had gathered, was because a Cloud’s Territory could genuinely be anything. Without careful consideration, it would be all too easy to accidentally stumble and intrude upon the Cloud’s Territory, leading to quite the unpleasant encounter.

Kyoya, as she had told her father upon some consideration, was easy to pin down. His Territory was the town of Namimori, and his rules ensured there was peace and order when the natural tendency of humans (particularly teenagers) was conflict. When Mukuro had intruded, he had been beyond livid and actually still held a grudge against him ten years in the future.

Masami’s Territory was her sense of self and her freedom. She hated having another dictate who she was or control her actions. As a teenager, she could tolerate it to some extent for her family and for her friends, but that had clearly been unsustainable. When Mukuro had intruded, she had almost torn herself to pieces rather than let him.

Her adult self, grown into her Cloud Flames, had been tempered through Harmonization with a Sky of Xanxus’ strength, so it was hard to speculate on how that dwindling tolerance would have eventually affected her future decisions and responses. That her had followed his orders, after all, willingly and without offense.

Kyoya, having Harmonized with Tsunayoshi, was the same, seeing as he had occasionally even left Namimori when necessary.

The current Masami, still keeping a distance from Xanxus and only given orders through the missions that landed on her desk, understood that the Cloud Division would never function as the Sun or even Rain Division did, with teamwork and dedicated squads for specific tasks.

That was alright. They didn’t need to. Xanxus and Squalo knew better than to expect that. Right now, all they needed to do was accept that she was not planning on infringing on their Territory and had the necessary expertise to delegate missions and information accordingly.

Then, they would be only too happy to leave her with the much dreaded paperwork and return to their usual habits. The rest would come with time.

Masami and Beelzebul came back from their successful mission in a week.

“She’s okay,” Beelzebul said to the rest of the Clouds, who had immediately gathered to interrogate him.

He was promptly skewered with a roomful of disbelieving stares. He understood their concerns, he really did, but…

“Don’t worry,” Beelzebul said with a grim smile, “she’s planning on taking a mission with everyone sooner or later. You’ll understand what I mean then.”

(Beelzebul’s Territory was his collection of knives and swords. Masami had very pointedly stayed away from them, given him the opening needed to retrieve one from the corpse, and introduced him to a swordsmith specializing in traditional katanas, whose craft went back ten generations.

She’d also saved his life once, so there was that.

She’d also proven herself to be utterly terrifying, so there was that.

“I have no interest in you and yours beyond the professional,” Masami had said to him over their dead target, still with that sweet, sweet smile. “Please, carry on doing your job as you have been for the past eight years, and let me do mine.”)

Three months passed in a blur of paperwork, missions, and chaos. Living at the Varia Compound somehow managed to be worse than all of Reborn’s antics combined, although Xanxus and Squalo rode herd on it for the most part. When they didn't, well, Masami turned a blind eye and let Housekeeping clean up the resulting mess.

For her part, Masami did the duties that were expected of her, killed the people she was sent to kill, and watched everything else silently, fan obscuring her expression from all those who sought to know. She had learned her lesson in shouldering responsibility for broken birds with Tsunayoshi and his people.

Xanxus kept his word, as she knew he would. Her missions were challenging in a way that turned her world so crystalline-clear that it almost hurt. She was accompanied by either one of her Clouds, Belphegor, or Lussuria. And when the mission was over, she was free to wander and explore to her heart’s content for at least a few days.

In her spare time, what little there was of it, she visited the ballet studio half an hour walk away and lingered in the nearby bookstores.

Everything was well. Yet, it felt like nothing but the calm before the storm, and Masami wasn’t sure she’d handle another curveball like Reborn with nearly as much grace as she had the first time around. These days, her instinct was to kill first and ask questions either later…or never.

"I'm...Kozato Enma."

Chapter Text

Minuet: a deceptively difficult dance for French aristocrats, conducted in triple meter

Surprisingly, the one who raised the alarm first was Tsuna. Kind, forgiving, trusting Tsuna.

This was a Tsuna who had gone to war for six long months in a future that he had seen destroyed with his own Flame. This was a Tsuna, who had learned to prioritize his own above all, who had stared death in the face and told it no, not today.

This was a Tsuna, who had, as Masami had once said, given up normalcy for everyone to live.

He watched the new transfer students introduce themselves with his Intuition ringing loud in his ears and shifted uneasily. By his side, Hayato and Takeshi glanced at him, too attuned to their Sky to not notice his anxiety immediately.

“Tsuna?”

“Juudaime?”

“What’s wrong?” they asked together and then shot mild glares at each other.

Tsuna hesitated. “I don’t know,” he said finally. “I think…we should talk to Kyoya.”

Hayato and Takeshi traded a long look, one hand going to the pocket with the lighter and the other going to the baseball bat in his bag. Their stances shifted in an instant, going into what Tsuna half-fondly and half-exasperatedly thought of as ‘bodyguard mode’.

“Okay, we’ll go talk to him at lunch,” Takeshi said with a smile that leaned just a little too sharp. “Don’t worry about it for now, ne?”

“Yeah, I’ll protect you, Juudaime!”

“Oh wait,” Tsuna realized. “I was too distracted to get their names.”

“Maa, I’m sure it can’t matter that much.”

The training room on the second floor of the Varia Compound was cast in darkness, the lights turned off. Only the light of the full moon outside the bulletproof windows illuminated the still figure standing in the center of the room.

An outsider looking in might see a petite, slender silhouette with enough vague curves to suggest a young woman. The smooth lines of her shadow was broken up by the indication of a flared hem at the knees and the rectangular heels at the feet. The head was decorated with loops and curls in some sort of elaborate style with long, cylindrical pins.

The figure broke from her stillness to raise a hand to the ceiling, and the distinctive shape of a fan joined the shape. The other arm was raised to the side, an identical-seeming fan held parallel to the floor.

New position in place, she froze once more, graceful and motionless as a marble statue of old.

A cloud passed over the moon, briefly throwing the room in utter darkness once more. When the moonlight creeped across the floor boards once more, like some unspoken signal had been given, the figure began to move at last in a dance that combined too many styles to be classified as any singular one.

Each practiced shift was done in agonizingly slow motion, as if her limbs were being dragged through quicksand, but there was no denying the utter control being displayed from the tip of her fingers to the points of her feet. A masterclass in how every part of the body was expressed in dance.

As the figure gradually twirled across the room, the edges of the two fans began to glow a soft purple. She began leaving streaks of purple light behind her with each movement of her hands, fiery after-images that dispersed into nothingness within moments. Strings of fireflies dancing in the night only to die when their short time came to an end.

It would have been a beautiful display on its own. But as if dissatisfied, she who was now surrounded by dissipating purple arcs of light began to move faster. And faster. The purple streaks became longer, spiraling in various shapes. It was as if an artist was doodling in the air with glow-in-the-dark purple paint.

Yet, the figure continued to move faster. Faster. Faster. Faster until the entire room was overlaid with crossing strands of purple Flame, its source nothing but a blur to the naked eye, more trails being created faster than the old ones could fade away. The pattern created was lovely if abstract, the kind of art that would be hung in museums for pedestrians to stare blankly at.

If the observing outsider had been Stupid enough to attempt to touch a part of the spider web being created before his eyes, he would have instantly developed third-degree burns on contact. Trying to charge through it with no protection would probably have resulted in a thousand corpse pieces left on the floor for Housekeeping to clean up in the morning.

The one who danced was still young, though. Still developing, still growing. She couldn’t keep this up for long. And indeed, a few minutes later, she started slowing down until she once more stood in the center of the room in the same position she started in.

There, she paused, still but for the panting breaths that shook her torso. A heartbeat passed. And then another.

Finally, training completed, the fans were snapped closed with a twitch of experienced fingers, and she relaxed into a more neutral position. As the sun creeped over the horizon, she spun and slid into an elegant curtsy for the watching outsider leaning against the open doorway.

“Greetings. Was there something I could help with?”

Xanxus just raised an eyebrow. “Go see Lussuria after breakfast. You pushed your left side too far. And stop doing this bullshit in the dark. We look like an amusement park out here.”

“What is it, small animal?” These days, Kyoya would, with great reluctance, situate himself on top of the water tower and eat his lunch there. So long as they didn’t get too loud, he’d even generously ignore the crowding happening below him on the rooftop.

And of course, should they forget this rule, he’d gleefully bit them to death.

(These days, his Elements all stayed as close to him as possible, equal parts protective and possessive. Tsuna hadn’t even been able to bring himself to complain, not when he grew anxious himself if he didn’t see everyone at least once a day.

Just to be sure everyone was still fine. Just to be sure everyone was still alive.)

Today, Tsuna had gathered up his courage and climbed up the ladder, Hayato and Takeshi right behind him. He looked up at the wandering Cloud whose shadow kept the entire school safe and knew he was going to make him distinctly unhappy with what he said next.

“Those new transfer students…did the Disciplinary Committee look into them?” he asked.

Kyoya, resting on his back with his head on his folded arms, grunted in response. “Their houses were impacted by the earthquake so they transferred here from Simon Middle School. Other than that, everything else looked fine. The littlest one lost his parents young.”

Tsuna wanted to hesitate, wanted to claim that maybe he was making something out of nothing, but he’d made that mistake in the future one too many times and people had gotten hurt because of it. Inaction had cost him far more than action ever had. “Can we look into them a little further?”

An ominous pause. Kyoya lifted his head and turned to peer down at him with narrowed grey-purple eyes. He could already feel those familiar Cloud Flames starting to stir with agitation. “More scavengers here to threaten the peace of Namimori, omnivore?”

Tsuna took a deep breath, took reassurance in the familiar presences of Hayato and Takeshi at his back. “My Intuition says they’re not what they appear to be,” he said honestly. “Whether that’s good or bad…well, it’s rarely been good for us before, right?”

“Hn.” Kyoya sat up in one fluid movement and jumped off the water tower to land beside Tsuna, already looking outwards to the Territory he claimed as his. “I will investigate. Small animal, ask the baby to look into them as well.”

Tsuna breathed a sigh of relief and felt his shoulders relax a touch. “Thank you, Kyoya.” His Cloud was ever dependable even when roaming as he pleased.

“Hmph, don’t get used to it.” Kyoya glanced at Hayato and Takeshi, who had remained quiet, content to let Tsuna do his thing. Adding more voices — and thus noise — to the space would only have aggravated Kyoya further. “Crowding herbivores, guard the omnivore well.”

“Tch, like I need you to tell me that, you violent prefect,” Hayato muttered but pressed closer to Tsuna all the same.

Takeshi laughed and placed a hand on Tsuna’s shoulder. “Of course we will, Kyoya. Good hunting.”

“You guys,” Tsuna said weakly after Kyoya had left, “I still need to breathe…”

“Whoops, sorry, Tsuna!”

“Juudaime! Are you okay!?”

“Shishishi, are you sure you’re ready for this, Signorina?” Belphegor grinned at the little lady standing opposite him in the large, reinforced training room, knives already held idly between his fingers. She had asked him for a sparring session yesterday, and he had been bored and curious enough to agree.

Right now, at rest, the Signorina gave off only the faintest trace of Cloud Flames as always, control immaculate; a fool could be fooled into thinking her easy prey ripe for the picking. She replied with a meaningless smile and a curtsy that would have made the Royal Governess cry tears of joy. “I am in Your Highness’ care.”

If nothing else, the Prince could appreciate that she was the only one around here who knew to show proper manners towards Royalty, however fake that courtesy might be. The Boss didn’t count — he was a King and acted as Kings should.

From what he remembered of that strange dream, she should put up a decent fight. “Very well. Then let’s get started.” And with a flick of his wrists, he sent his knives flying. Perfectly on target, of course.

Without so much as a blink, the Signorina batted them all aside with her tessen with enough force to embed the knives on each side of the wall. Did she know about his wires? The placement of each discarded knife and subsequent wire created a rather convenient criss-crossed path between them.

Well, no matter. Even if she did know, that wouldn’t save her. Belphegor sent out another wave of knives absently and was met with the same reaction. Now, wires divided the room and neither would be able to cross without cutting themselves. And still, she hadn’t moved from her spot so much as a centimeter.

“Do you even have any long-range capabilities?” he asked curiously. Would she put herself at such a disadvantage on purpose or was she simply dumber than he thought?

“Do I?”

Half a second later, pure instinct had him jerking to the side before a projectile could hit the side of his throat. Belphegor glanced back and saw one of her hair pins quivering in the wall, lingering wisps of Cloud Flames already quietly vanishing.

Oh? That moved much faster through the air than it should have. “So you’ve learned to infuse your weapons with your Flames. Not bad.”

It was a significant jump from bolstering yourself with your Flames — something most Flame Users did, unconsciously or not — to pouring enough Flame into an inanimate object for enough of it to take effect mid-air and not immediately disperse as soon as contact was broken. Her progress was still slower than Belphegor’s had been, but he was a genius. It wouldn’t be fair to hold peasants up to the same standards he held himself to.

“But is that all you can do?” Belphegor let his own Storm Flames flare, sharpening his sight and warming the metal held in his hands. Like this, he could clearly see all of his wires spread out across the room, and yes, the placement had to have been deliberate by her to impede both of their movements equally.

She still hadn’t made any move to seriously attack rather than deflect. How odd, he would have expected more…initiative from a Cloud who might be able to settle in the Boss’ Inner Court. “If you continue wasting my time, I’ll have to punish you. Because I am a Prince.”

“Apologies, your Highness. I just needed a little time to warm up.” Without warning or any prior build-up that he would have sensed, elegantly vicious Cloud Flames spiked, subtly tinged with hunger and gluttony enough to engulf the entire planet under its umbra, all concentrated in her fans and her feet.

The Signorina lunged forward at last in a burst of speed that even Belphegor’s eyes had some trouble tracking, an ambush predator unleashed and ready to kill their prey with one lethal bite, a cheetah sprinting across the plains. With the sharp edge of her Flame-lined fan, she sliced through all of the wires in-between them effortlessly and was right in front of him, midway through a swing that would decapitate him, having crossed the entire room in two seconds flat.

Belphegor laughed. “Yes. Yes, that’s more like it!”

“I can look into it,” Reborn said, later that night when the children were asleep. “But you have bigger things to worry about, Dame-Tsuna.”

“Eh? Like what?”

Reborn waved an ornate-looking envelope at him. “The Ninth sends his regards. It’s time for your Inheritance Ceremony. It’ll be next week.”

“Hieeeeeeeee!? Already!?” Tsuna flailed, heart suddenly going double-time. He knew what the Ceremony was, of course, but — “I thought that would be when I’m eighteen! Isn’t this too early!?” He’d thought he had four more years to figure out the whole Mafia situation!

Reborn jumped up and bopped him with a Leon-ruler on the head gently…by Reborn standards anyway. “Panicking is not Mafia Boss Behavior,” he scolded. “You should never lose your head when faced with unexpected news.”

“Ow,” Tsuna pouted, cradling the new lump on his skull. “No one would be calm when told they’re going to inherit the biggest, baddest Mafia Family in a week, Reborn.”

“You need to be anyway,” Reborn said, as implacable as ever. “And as for why now…” He tilted his fedora forward to shadow his eyes, and oh no, that was a huge red flag. “The Ninth didn’t say but I suspect he thinks Xanxus is a threat to the Family.”

…wait, what?

“Xanxus?” Tsuna repeated, honestly confused.

He had met the Varia Boss again in that bloody not-future and had found him much more settled, his Sky Flames no longer screaming in Discord as they had during the Ring Battles and instead solidly balanced by a complete set of Guardians. Xanxus had even, if somewhat begrudgingly, called him “baby Decimo” the entire time and saved his life once or twice.

The man Tsuna had met…had been intense and fierce and violently protective. Exactly how a Wrath Sky should be, and one that Tsuna had recognized, even in his inexperience, any Mafia Boss should be honored to have in their Family.

The one and only time Tsuna had brushed his Flames against Xanxus’, the older Sky had been grouchily teaching him how to use the Harmonization aspect of Sky Flames to help Discordant Elements heal. It had been one of the few Sky-specialties that Future Dino really hadn’t been able to help him with but one that had been essential at the time with Mukuro and Chrome teetering on the brink, stressed to the breaking point by the Vindice and Byakuran’s games.

(Oh! That reminded him, he really needed to persuade Chrome, Ken, and Chikusa to move out of the dump that was Kokuyo Land and come live in Namimori. And he had to find enough leverage to get the Vindice to release Mukuro.

Ughhhh, Tsuna could scream sometimes when looking at his to-do list since returning from the not-future.)

Back then, Xanxus’ Flame had been coiled and powerful but not aggressive, like a sleepy dragon uninterested in chomping on you unless you went after its treasures. Tsuna had been startled by the whisper of Cloud that rose from the very center of those Flames to greet him, a Cloud that he had recognized immediately though he’d never actively felt it before while Flame Active.

Future Masami’s Flames had been as cool and graceful as she must have been herself, making contact with a soft, careful touch before retreating once more. Finally properly Harmonized with Kyoya as he had been — during the very peak of battle, of course, both of them barely alive, after a match in stubbornness and frustration — Tsuna had been astounded at how her Flames differed from her brother’s.

Kyoya’s Flames were so pure and powerful that only the Vongola Cloud Ring could match him. He was a thick, dense, far-reaching Cloud in Tsuna’s Sky, forever floating up high but always there and visible, casting a long shadow that Tsuna could hide under whenever he needed a break.

Future Masami’s Flames in Xanxus’ Sky had been more of a…fog? Light, airy, and dispersed, liable to fade away silently in the morning blue. Her Secondary Mist Flames had been much stronger than Kyoya’s, creating a strange sense of constant movement, too faint to pinpoint but disorientating enough to have given Tsuna second-hand car sickness anyway.

(Xanxus had laughed for a solid five minutes when Tsuna had gone green at first contact and had to run to the bathroom to throw up.)

If Kyoya was an easy to find but too strong to control Cloud, then Masami had been a drifting Cloud just out of reach and too insubstantial to trap, always one gust ahead of you.

Xanxus’ Sky had been spread wide and free, not surrounding or enveloping Masami’s Flames at all. Like an open home base whenever that Cloud wanted to rest in it for a while, light as a feather barely touching the ground before being blown off by the wind again, rather than a confining house.

In fact, all of his Bonds had been like that, some sticking closer than others, but each and every one free to wander as far as they pleased, because Xanxus’ Sky had been powerful enough to stretch from horizon to horizon, and nowhere was too far or out of his reach. No matter where they went, they would go underneath that vast, watchful Sky.

To this day, Future Xanxus was the only Sky that Tsuna had ever met who could do that. Dino, Uni, Tsuna and even Byakuran instinctively sheltered their Elements snug within their Sky, providing a place where they would always belong and keeping everyone close.

That kind of rare autonomous mentality was probably what made Xanxus such an excellent Sky for the Varia, where they needed more independence and space than more traditional Families.

Tsuna certainly couldn’t have done it. Even now, he carefully brushed all of his Bonds with a touch of Sky to reassure himself that they were all still there and safe, and got a gentle pulse back from each one, even the sleeping Lambo.

(Well, Kyoya’s response was more of an irritated why-are-you-disturbing-me-omnivore bonk but same thing.)

How could that Xanxus, perhaps slightly different now in the past but still the same person, and Masami’s Sky, be a threat? To the Family of all things? Xanxus loved Vongola. It was the crown on which all of his other jewels rested, the greatest of his treasures.

“Tsk. Use your thick head, Dame-Tsuna. With Masami joining the Varia and nominally in the Cloud Officer position, Xanxus now has a full set of Guardians, which he didn’t before. He’s more powerful now. Naturally, the Ninth is concerned that he’ll plan another coup,” Reborn said.

Tsuna…squinted. “That doesn’t sound right,” he said dubiously. “Are you sure Vongola Nono is using his head?”

“It’s not the place of subordinates to question the Boss,” Reborn quipped, which was all but an agreement from him. “Anyways, regardless of the reason, the Ceremony has already been announced, and Mafia from around the world will be gathered to witness your ascension.”

Tsuna grimaced and looked out his bedroom window. All of that sounded awful to him. It wasn’t too late to beg Kyoya to help him run away to the Carribeans, was it? He knew some English now, he’d be fine.

WHACK!

“Don’t even think about it, Dame-Tsuna.”

“Hiiiiiieeeeeee! Reborn! That hurt!”

…actually, speaking of Xanxus and Masami…

“You have Squalo’s number, right, Takeshi?” Tsuna asked the next morning, swerving into a road they didn’t normally take to school when his Intuition gave a grumpy warning. He would be avoiding the new transfer students as much as possible, thanks.

“Yeah! Why, what’s up, Tsuna?” Takeshi folded his arms behind his head, deceptively at ease as if his eyes weren’t constantly scanning their surroundings for threats.

Tsuna resisted the urge to sigh. Everyone was so paranoid now. Including himself. “Can you call him? I want to talk to Masami-san if I can.” If he was going to be Vongola Decimo — which he was still trying to think of a way out of — then he might as well use the Family resources.

He wasn’t going to ask Vongola Nono for help, though, not after what Reborn had told him last night. And the less said about his useless father, the better.

“Sure! Hold up a second.”

Hayato grumbled under his breath and dragged them under a nearby tree, chewing aggressively on the gum that he’d started using to break off his nicotine addiction. “Why are we contacting her, Juudaime? If you need any help, I’d be more than happy to serve!”

Tsuna sweatdropped. “Hayato, you’re going to mess up your jaw if you keep chewing like that.” The chewing calmed down instantly. “And I know we’re going to be really busy preparing for the Ceremony and all that. The Varia won’t be. Probably.”

Hayato somehow blushed and started tearing up at the same time. “Juudaime…! You’re such a considerate Boss! We don’t deserve you!”

“There, there.” Tsuna helplessly pat Hayato on the head and looked at Takeshi for help, only to get an amused grin in response. A second later, a ringing phone was put on speaker and pressed into his hand.

Squalo picked up on the third ring, already yelling in Japanese. “YOU! WHAT DO YOU WANT!? JUST BECAUSE MY NUMBER DIDN’T CHANGE DOESN’T MEAN YOU GET TO CALL WHENEVER YOU WANT! DO YOU KNOW HOW LATE IT IS!? I’M BUSY!”

Tsuna winced and held the phone farther away from him. By his side, Takeshi laughed and leaned over his shoulder to say into the phone, “But you recognized my number and picked up immediately, Squalo, even though I’ve never called you in this time before.”

“SHUT UP! THAT’S JUST QUALITY, DAMN IT!”

“Maa, sure, sure. Hey, Tsuna wants to talk to Masami, could you patch us through?”

“YOU! WHAT AM I, A SECRETARY!? FUCK OFF AND CALL HER YOURSELF!”

“But we don’t have her number.”

“Sounds like a skill issue,” Squalo groused, quieter but still unimpressed. “Better level up, brat, you’re still a long way from Varia Quality.”

“Hey, just because you guys have turned stalking into an art — ”

“Squalo-san,” Tsuna finally cut in before they got hung up on. “It’s about a possible threat to Vongola and Namimori. Masami-san would want to know.”

A long silent pause. Tsuna fidgeted and hoped he wouldn’t hang up anyway. Hayato gave him a thumbs-up and a proud smile, tears streaming down his face. Takeshi just patted his shoulder reassuringly and grinned.

“...fine,” Squalo grumbled at last. “But get her number this time, you! This is the only time I’ll do this!”

And then, before anyone could respond, they got treated to what the Varia seemed to think of as waiting music: hardcore American rap with enough curse words thrown in that Tsuna could recognize them.

“...” they said.

Thankfully, half a minute later, there was a click and a familiar voice speaking in gently accented Italian. “Greetings.”

Tsuna perked up, already feeling much better. He would sometimes get updates from Kyoya on how Masami was doing if he asked on a good day, but it had been a while since he’d heard her voice himself. “Masami-san! It’s me, Tsuna!”

“Hey, Masami!”

“Ugh, it’s the maiko witch.”

A soft laugh. “Greetings, everyone,” she said, switching smoothly to Japanese. “To what do I owe the honor of a call transferred from Squalo-san himself?”

Tsuna cringed at the reminder. “Yeah, sorry about that…”

“We wouldn’t have had to resort to this if you had just given us your new number in the first place, maiko witch!” Hayato bristled in place and shoved another piece of gum in his mouth.

“Well, this is the first time in a while that I’ve had access to a secure landline. But you’re right that this is a matter that should be remedied. I’ll text you my new number.”

“Oh.” Hayato blinked, building fury abruptly deflating at the unexpectedly agreeable response. It didn’t even sound like she was being sarcastic. “Yeah, well, you’d better,” he finally muttered, kicking a pebble on the ground with his hands in his pockets.

Tsuna held back a smile at his cute Storm before straightening up and focusing back on important topics. Hayato and Takeshi mirrored him immediately, the air turning serious in an instant. “Masami-san, I have a mission for the Varia. Off the books.”

“...oh? Should I be transferring this call to Xanxus-san?” Masami sounded idly curious but not especially invested or concerned.

Tsuna noted the lack of title given to Xanxus but didn’t comment. “Not yet,” he said. “I don’t want to bother him until I have something more concrete. But I do need the Varia’s information-gathering abilities.”

Masami hummed and replied, “Alright. I’m listening.”

Oh good. He hadn’t really expected Masami to turn him down but giving orders like this, even circumstantially, to a Cloud not his own had still been a risk. (Though, to be honest, Kyoya still didn’t listen to him half the time.) That was one hurdle down. “Seven students just transferred to Namimori Middle. My Intuition marked them as a potential threat, and I want to know why.”

He glanced at Hayato, who nodded, ever prepared, already tapping away at his phone. “Hayato’s sending you the details. Kyoya and Reborn are looking into it, too, but we’ll all be busy with the Inheritance Ceremony soon, and I don’t want this left by the wayside.”

Masami was silent, presumably reading through whatever Hayato had sent her. As the lack of response stretched, though, Tsuna couldn’t help but anxiously prompt, “Masami-san?” Did he push too far? Was she mad at him?

To his surprise, she finally replied in a tone far warmer than anything he’d ever heard from her before, “You’re much stronger and more proactive these days, Tsunayoshi-san. I’m very proud of you.”

“Oh!” Tsuna had to take a second to process that and then immediately blushed bright red. He couldn’t help it — Masami was the first person he had ever genuinely sought approval from after Mom and to hear it like this —

His stomach did something funny. His cheeks burned. Tsuna blabbered something nonsensical and promptly fainted.

“Tsuna!”

“Juudaime!”

(Masami listened to the chaos on the other side of the line and laughed quietly to herself. “Some things never change,” she mused and hung up.)

Half a world away, Masami considered the new task she had been handed. She doubted the boys had remembered that Italy was seven whole hours behind Japan, which meant it was currently the witching hour here.

Not that the Varia ever slept. She had been in her office (the Cloud Officer’s office) when the call had been transferred over. With the exception of perhaps Belphegor who prized his Royal Sleep, the other Officers were probably all awake, too.

Information gathering on this scale wasn’t really the Cloud Division’s strong suit. There was a reason that the intra-Division Info Team was mostly made up of Mists with some Rains and Suns thrown in. But an “off the books” mission…

Well. She did know one particular Mist with excellent information gathering skills. And she even knew what they would ask for in exchange.

“Officer Mammon.”

“Mou.” They looked up from this quarter’s budget sheets to see the Boss’ new Nameless Cloud curtsying in their doorway, amused by the title she had taken to calling them to satisfy her need for formality. “What is it?”

“I have a personal request.”

“That’ll be €1000,” they replied automatically.

She looked them straight in the hood and walked forward to put a stack of euros on their table. “Done.”

Oh? Mammon swooped down to grab the stack and count through the bills at lightning speed. Exactly as they’d requested, not a single euro short. “Mou, I’m impressed. You know the value of money. Fine, talk.”

“I want a thorough background check on the Simon Family.”

“A whole Family?” Mammon said dubiously. “That’ll be expensive.”

“As far as I can tell, the Family is composed of seven main members.”

Ah. Nevermind. “Transfer an amount equal to an S-Rank Mission pay to my bank account and I’ll do it,” Mammon said, knowing full well that this sort of mission would typically be classified as B-Rank at best.

If she wanted a mediocre job done, then she could go to someone else. If she wanted the World’s Strongest Esper, then she’d need to pay the price.

The only one for whom Mammon would ever do anything for free was their Sky. This was already a discounted rate from their usual, in concession to the fact that the one asking was a potential fellow Element their Sky was courting.

She took out her phone from her pocket and tapped at it for a minute. “Done.”

Mammon checked their bank account and nodded in approval. “Transaction completed. When do you need the information?”

“As soon as possible.”

“Mou, I should charge you an expedition fee, but I’ll let you off this once. I’ll come find you in the evening.”

“Thank you, Officer Mammon.”

Mammon was Quality and an Arcobaleno to boot. When they said they would deliver, they delivered.

Masami flipped through the report they had handed her exactly as promised and sighed. She had hoped this would remain a small concern, easily dealt with. Instead, she got a ticking time bomb all the way from Vongola’s founding.

How irritating. How like Tsunayoshi’s luck that this matter had been buried for nine whole generations but chose to resurface now.

Standing up, she left her office and headed straight for Xanxus’. Even from the hallway outside, she could feel the supernova Wrath Flames burning inside like a kotatsu that would gladly provide warmth and protection if only she let it.

Masami ignored it as usual and knocked.

“Come in.”

Masami stepped inside with a curtsy and got an idle glance from crimson eyes. It looked like Xanxus had already completed all of his paperwork and was preparing to either sleep or go blow up training dummies on the second floor. It was always hard to tell with him. “What is it?”

“I received a request from Signore Tsunayoshi to investigate a potential threat to the Vongola early this morning,” she said. “The background check from Officer Mammon puts this threat at SSS level and could result in interference at the Inheritance Ceremony.”

As she’d expected, the mention of a threat to the Vongola got his attention immediately, despite the instinctual flicker of annoyance that Tsunayoshi’s name prompted. Xanxus scowled and rounded his desk. When he held out his hand, she relinquished the report without protest.

Masami waited patiently as Xanxus rapidly scanned the papers with practiced focus, frown deepening by the page. “What the fuck is this bullshit?” he growled. “From Primo’s time? Really!? And right when the old man’s losing his shit, too.”

She held back a grimace. So far, Xanxus hadn’t brought her to any of his required weekly meetings with the Ninth, for which she was grateful for. Everytime they came back from the Main House, Squalo would have steam coming out of his ears while Xanxus blanketed the entire Compound in his Wrath and shot at anyone Stupid enough to get in his way.

…Masami might be getting a bit spoiled, surrounded as she was by competent agents who either took care of themselves with little to no attention from her or removed themselves from the premises in a body bag if they didn’t. As a result, her tolerance for foolishness had greatly decreased, which could be a problem if she ever did have to meet the Ninth Generation.

Fortunately, she was both still technically on “probation” and also not one of Xanxus’ Guardians. She could dodge useless political meetings for a while longer.

Unfortunately, that didn’t mean she wasn’t well aware of the myriad of issues that masqueraded as Vongola Nono and Xanxus’ familial relationship. Not something she wanted to touch with a ten meter pole, even if it looked more and more likely that she wouldn’t be able to bypass all of it without drastic measures.

“Tsk…what’s all this about Sin and Penalty? What are we, a fucking church!?” Xanxus finally looked up and tossed back the file. “Make a copy and send it to the Officers. And tell the shitty shark and fucking peacock to get in here. Something big like this, I have to tell the old man myself.”

Masami nodded, expression neutral. “And Signore Tsunayoshi?”

Xanxus made a face like it disgusted him to even think about their prospective new Don but seemed more resigned than angry. They had been…not close but not antagonistic in that strange not-future, hadn’t they? The details had long since slipped her mind, as dreams were wont to do. “Since that wimpy trash had the nerve to ask, may as well send it to him, too. We can’t look like fucking sissies at our own Inheritance Ceremony.”

“Ehhhhhhh!? There are Flames of the Earth, too!?” Tsuna was baffled. Baffled. He had finally gotten his head wrapped around the whole Flames of the Sky business, and now there was more!? How was this fair!?

“I’ve never heard of it either,” Reborn commented, going over the report that Masami had sent them with a handheld magnifying glass in a full-on detective outfit. “Looks like your Intuition was right, Dame-Tsuna. Congratulations.”

“Not one of those words were helpful,” Tsuna informed his sadistic tutor. “Not one.”

“I can always say more of them if you want.”

“No thanks.” Tsuna made an X with his arms and groaned, ruffling his hair. “Great, now we’ve got another Family after us for some historical betrayal that no one’s heard of, with Flames that also no one’s heard of. And the Inheritance Ceremony is in eleven days!”

“You should think on the bright side, Dame-Tsuna. Now you can get rid of two birds with one stone by defeating the Simon Family and thereby proving your strength to the Mafia at your Ceremony.”

“Reborn, why is your solution always violence!?”

“Violence gets results.”

Tsuna rolled his eyes and got up. It was almost time for school, and he could feel Hayato and Takeshi waiting for him from the gentle tugs on his Flames. If he delayed anymore, they’d panic and probably kick the front door down. Again.

“That’s not the kind of person I want to be,” he said. “I’ll discuss this with the others and see what they think.”

Reborn watched from a nearby tree, binoculars in hand, as Tsuna gathered his Guardians around him on the rooftop as much as he could. The Bovino brat was still in elementary school. Mukuro was present only through Chrome, and Hibari stayed on top of the water tower.

Mukuro and Hibari still avoided each other whenever possible. The only time Hibari would so much as tolerate Mukuro’s presence was if a) Tsuna was in the area to appease them both with his Sky Flames, b) it was a truly urgent situation, and c) he was out of sight, out of hearing, and concealing his Flames beneath Chrome’s so Hibari could pretend with some plausible deniability that he didn’t exist.

Tsuna was working on it. Perhaps one day they might even cooperate as Guardians should, if only for Tsuna’s sake.

His student was progressing nicely. Being thrown ten years into the future and then straight onto a war torn battlefield hadn’t been something even Reborn could have planned for, but it had worked out in the end:

Dame-Tsuna had finally properly Harmonized with all of his Elements and started coming into his own as a Sky.

As Reborn had always told him, facing down adversity together was a powerful bonding experience. The kids were all closer now, to Tsuna and to each other, and stronger for it. Sure, they had all been forced to grow up and were blooded far earlier than he had planned, but —

Even Reborn, the World’s Strongest Hitman, couldn’t shield them from the Millefiore’s danger while trapped at the base due to the poison radiation in the air. There had been nothing he could do but train them and provide coaching from afar, no matter how much that had smarted.

Still, what was done was done. However unconsciously, Tsuna was taking care of his Family as a Mafia Boss should, as a Sky should, and even reaching out further to the Varia through his existing relationship with the new Cloud Officer. That was well-beyond what Reborn had originally expected at this point in his training.

Now, he just needed a little more seasoning and experience before he’d make a magnificent Mafia Boss. That, and an important enough incentive to actually take the position. Tsuna was a classic Sky; a threat to his chosen Family that could only be defied through the power offered by Vongola was Reborn’s bet.

True, Tsuna could probably be more adjusted to the Mafia policy of ‘shoot first and ask never’, but Reborn wasn’t holding his breath on that one. Even he couldn’t get a stubborn Sky with a full set of Guardians backing him up to transform into a full-on ‘carnivore’, as Hibari would call it, against his will.

Reborn had come to terms with that months in and had thus been completely unsurprised when Tsuna had come out of that future war with blood on his hands but that soft, pacifist heart unchanged. Tsuna had at least come to terms with the need to fight and even kill for his Family, even if that wasn’t his first response.

Perhaps that was for the better, given Nono’s hopes for the Vongola Decimo’s inevitable reign.

For now, Reborn would watch and wait to see what this new Generation would decide.

Takeshi listened closely as Tsuna explained the situation to them, Hayato chiming in here and there with more details from the file that he had already memorized on the way to school. Maybe Before, he would have tuned out all the small details, but he’d learned his lesson.

A new opponent in the Mafia Game right as Tsuna was about to level-up? Come on, that wasn’t sportsmanship-like at all.

“Gah,” Hayato grumbled after everything was cleanly laid out. “Who knew those new transfer students would be this bothersome! We should just wipe them all out before they become a threat to Juudaime.”

“Kufufufu, I agree,” said the illusory Mukuro sitting next to Chrome.

“Shut up! I wasn’t talking to you!”

“They do sound very extreme!” Ryohei said, on his feet and working off his extra energy by practicing boxing moves on an imaginary opponent. “I’m sure we can become friends though! After an extreme fight, just like with the Varia!”

“You — turftop idiot, that’s not how it works!”

“Eh? I thought the winner gets the loser’s friendship! Isn’t that the extreme rule of the Mafia?”

“Well, yes, but not like that! Argh, explaining anything to dumbasses is a waste of my brain…”

“That’s not very extreme at all, octopus head!”

“OI!”

“Hahaha, what do you think, Tsuna?” Takeshi asked his best friend under the dim of everyone’s usual antics.

Tsuna had been tense and anxious over this all morning, and he still had that worried furrow to his brow now. It was too reminiscent of how he had looked Before, and Takeshi didn’t like to see it. He had developed a little trick though. Takeshi let out a gentle ripple of Rain Flames and was satisfied to feel Tsuna relax and lean against him. The sudden quiet from the others was a bonus.

“...I don’t know,” Tsuna responded, staring blankly into his half-eaten bento box. “I don’t want to fight if we can talk it out. Maybe there’s a misunderstanding somewhere. We don’t have a clue what these new Flames of Earth can do, so I’d rather avoid a fight if we can.”

Takeshi hummed encouragingly. “Yeah? We can do that.” And if they didn’t respond well to talking it out…well, there was always his sword to help Tsuna out.

Hayato echoed his thoughts, as he usually did nowadays in matters regarding Tsuna, “And if not, we’ll just wipe them all out for you, Juudaime! They can’t be allowed to interrupt your big day!”

“Why do you make it sound like my wedding or something…?” Tsuna sighed and looked up at the Mist Twins. “What do you think, Chrome?”

Chrome startled, still shy and used to fading into the background although they had all been working on that. “M-Me? Umm…I think…it’s a good idea but we should be prepared if things go badly.”

“Kufufufu, my darling Chrome is right. No one from the Mafia can be trusted,” Mukuro said, conveniently ignoring the fact that he was also from the Mafia. “You should be ready for them to betray you, Tsunayoshi. Just like how one day I will betray you and take control of your body.”

“Okay, Mukuro,” Tsuna said, unconcerned. Mukuro made that threat all the time and never went through with it. It was kind of funny now. Even Tsuna had stopped reacting to it after the third time Mukuro put himself in the line of fire to save him during their trip to the future.

(Takeshi tried not to think too hard about the Before of their return, of that particular level in the Mafia Game. It always made him feel unarmed and undefended, out in the open for anyone to take a shot at them. Snipers were such a cheat.)

“Actually, on that subject,” Tsuna said, brightening a little, “Hayato, have you had any luck?”

Hayato sat up straight and nodded eagerly. “Yes, Juudaime! Like you asked, I looked into past cases when the Vindice let a prisoner go. I think, once you’re Vongola Decimo, you’ll have the power and standing to bargain with the Vindice into letting that stupid pineapple go into your custody.”

Off to the side, Mukuro visibly jerked. Tsuna was taking in everything Hayato said with his Serious Game Face on, his Sky aglow in his eyes. He nodded and said thoughtfully, “Okay, so as long as the Inheritance Ceremony proceeds, then — ”

“Tsunayoshi,” Mukuro cut in, eyes wide and illusory form wavering. Woah, Takeshi had never seen him do anything like this before. He didn’t know why Mukuro was so surprised; he clearly hadn’t been paying enough attention to Tsuna.

Although, to be fair, it was probably hard to do that when you were semi-possessing someone else’s mind and mostly stuck in Vindicare.

This sounded like a super convenient solution, though, especially with that ceremony coming up so soon. And pretty much tailor-made to convince Tsuna, who would do anything for them, to finally give in and accept the position he’d been resisting for as long as Takeshi had known about the Mafia Game.

…huh. That was kinda suspicious. Takeshi wondered if Hayato had ended up finding research conveniently placed by a certain kid who was really invested in Tsuna becoming Boss. He would have to ask Hayato about it later.

“What are you doing!?” Mukuro hissed, sounding well and truly agitated now. “I’m perfectly fine where I am, I don’t need your pity! And to accept the position of Vongola Decimo — I thought you were better than that — ”

“Mukuro,” Tsuna said, frowning now. “You can’t think I was ever going to leave you there, did you?”

Mukuro gaped at him. Chrome glanced rapidly between Mukuro and Tsuna, hope and delight starting to bloom on her face. For his part, Takeshi just grinned and leaned back on his hands, letting Tsuna work his magic even on the recalcitrant Mist.

“You’re one of mine,” Tsuna continued solemnly, and they could all feel his Sky expanding to fill the rooftop, pure and vast and the truest home Takeshi had ever known. He sighed, relaxing into it, while Hayato near melted onto the ground. Ryohei settled nearby with a warm grin.

Mukuro looked like someone had hit him on the head with a baseball or maybe torn his entire world out from underneath him. Yeah, Takeshi was familiar with that feeling. On an entirely separate page from her twin, Chrome was beaming now, something almost smug in her expression.

Tsuna stared at him with his beautiful orange eyes and said, unyielding conviction ringing in every word, “I’ll get you out. Even if that means becoming Vongola Decimo. I promise you, Mukuro.”

And how could anyone ever doubt him when he spoke like that?

Mukuro spent a long moment looking back at Tsuna like he was a dream born from his deepest wishes or perhaps a particularly cruel illusion. Finally, he ducked his head and looked at the ground. “...very well. I’ll hold you to that, Tsunayoshi.”

And if his voice was kinda strangled and choked, well, everyone here would do him the favor of pretending not to notice.

Tsuna nodded firmly. “Good. And once you’re out, you can bring Chrome and the others to come live in Namimori.”

“Now you’re getting ahead of yourself,” Mukuro grumbled. As if he wasn’t pointedly looking away with a faint blush on his face. Poor guy really didn’t like being this transparent, huh.

RING!

“Oh, hey, that’s the bell,” Takeshi said into the startled silence.

Half a second later, Kyoya jumped down from the water tower with tonfas already in hand. “I’ve graciously tolerated all of this crowding today, but tardiness is against the rules. I will bite you all to death.”

“HIEEEEEEEEEEE!”

Hahaha…whoops.

“So? What have you decided, Dame-Tsuna?”

“...I’ll go forward with the Ceremony. And I want to arrange a meeting between me and the Simon Boss. Hopefully, we can talk this out and no one will have to get hurt.”

“And if you can’t?”

“...Reborn, can you give me a chance to talk to Vongola Nono?”

“Of course. He’s already on his way here anyway.”

“EHHHH? REBORN, YOU CAN’T JUST SPRING THAT ON ME OUT OF NOWHERE!”

“Sure I can. I did just now. He’s bringing the Varia, too.”

Tsuna started sobbing into his pillow.

Masami took back her previous thought about being able to avoid useless political meetings for a while longer. If she had known this would be the result of indulging Tsunayoshi’s request, she’d have stopped then and there.

…well, not really, but she could dream.

“I feel like I should be asking for a pay raise,” she mused to herself.

“I can give you a lesson in negotiation for €15000,” Mammon said. “It’s an important life skill.”

Xanxus scoffed, lounging back with his arms crossed and a foot on the table. “Your six months aren’t over yet. Dream on.”

“I’m definitely not getting paid enough for this.” Masami glanced around the private jet heading towards Namimori and then the file of the Ninth Generation on her lap. “No other ‘probational’ rookie is being brought along to bodyguard the Vongola Dons.”

“Ha, you got that right!” Squalo threw back his glass of vodka and wiped his mouth. “Vongola Nono even made it a mission for us.”

“Mou, the pay is right.”

“Shishishi, it’ll take Quality to take on those so-called ‘Flames of the Earth’,” Belphegor pointed out, flipping a gleaming knife between his fingers absently.

“That’s if we even get to fight them,” Leviathan grumbled. “Otherwise, it’s just a bodyguard job.”

And barely that. They were all ignoring the blatant attempt at keeping them in sight and on a leash while the Ninth Generation was out gallivanting around.

“Aww, don’t worry, hun,” Lussuria patted the armrest of the seat next to her, knowing better than to touch her without an invitation. “I’m sure we can talk about the terms of your contract based on your performance here when we get back.”

Xanxus opened one eye to blink lazily at her. “You’d have to stop fucking waffling about first. Permanent Varia Contracts don’t mess around.”

Like they weren’t all just waiting for her to give in and either Harmonize or Reject Xanxus. Pity that Masami had only grown into her Cloud stubbornness during her time refining her Flames at the Varia. The more they pushed, the harder she dug her heels in.

For now, she made a noncommittal sound. She would see what Kyoya’s Harmonization with Tsunayoshi looked like firsthand and also see another example in the Ninth Generation. Maybe then she would make a decision.

Maybe.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought. Oi, shitty shark! Bring me more wine.”

“YOU! DO I LOOK LIKE A SERVER TO YOU, BOSS!?”

“Nono and his Guardians are here, Dame-Tsuna.”

“What about the Varia?”

“They’re coming on a different flight. They’ll probably arrive tonight.”

“Okay. I…want to meet Vongola Nono and Xanxus-san together.”

“I can arrange that but you had better not back out, Dame-Tsuna.”

“Rebooooorn! I won’t!”

It was surprisingly anti-climactic to step on Namimori soil once more. Technically, she had been away for less than half a year. What a change half a year (and a decade) could make.

The Masami of then would hardly recognize the Masami of now. Would probably be disappointed, in fact, at what she had become. What she had let the Mafia make her despite all her claims to the contrary.

Well, too bad for her. She had lost the right to make those decisions, because she had been too weak, and the weak didn’t get to decide the path of their lives.

Masami had traded her naivety for strength and agency. She refused to regret it.

“We’re going to the hotel,” Xanxus decreed in a bored tone and strolled right past her.

“Yes, Boss!” Leviathan hurried after him.

Squalo huffed but followed while tossing over his shoulder, “You, go do whatever you do.”

“Does the Signorina need an escort?” Belphegor asked with a grin, all mocking chivalry.

“I thank Your Highness for his concern, but I believe I’ll be just fine,” Masami murmured from behind her fan.

“Shishishi, very well. Come on, Mammon, you’re lagging behind.”

“I’m the one who can teleport,” Mammon pointed out dryly.

Masami tuned out the bickering and looked to the horizon. It was almost sunset. It was time to go home.

It felt odd to stand in front of that familiar ancient manor and knock on her own wooden doors. But Masami didn’t know where her key was, could barely recall how she had last left Namimori; it was all a blur.

A beat. A pause. The doors swung open. Her big brother stood in front of her, with eyes older than she remembered, dressed in his favorite kinagashi, and held out a hand adorned with a Ring that sang of generations of Cloud Flames.

“Masami. Okaeri.”

She took his hand, and this, at least, was familiar. The same hand that had held her since she was a toddler who could barely walk and steaded her when she wobbled all throughout childhood. The same calloused hand that had protected her all her life.

“Onii-san. Tadaima.”

Home…was as it stood in her memories and yet not. She walked down the hallway and couldn’t tell whether a painting missing from the wall was here before she left or acquired sometime in the next ten years. The zabuton was soft on her knees but not the right shade of brown her memories (?) insisted it should be.

The taste of tea was right though. As was the smell of the garden and the feel of the tatami mats beneath her feet. The Hibari Kamon remained proud and vibrant on the wall, not yet bombed to oblivion with the rest of Namimori.

That night, the siblings didn’t speak. They sat together and drank tea, admired the moon, and then curled up together in the same futon like they were children once more.

It was enough.

Enough to be home.

“Ne, Hayato, you sure the kid didn’t plant those materials on the Vindice?”

“Of course he did, baseball idiot. But I made sure they were real and that nothing else existed, too. I’m not fucking stupid.”

“Maa, okay, okay. I was just checking — you know how the kid can get. And I know you’ve always wanted Tsuna to be the Boss of the Mafia Game.”

“Ugh, how many times do I have to tell you, it’s not a game! And even though I do think Juudaime deserves nothing less than the position of Vongola Decimo, I would never put my opinions above what our Sky wants. It just so happens that what he wants this time is that pineapple weirdo freed.”

“And what Tsuna wants, Tsuna gets.”

“Damn right.”

The next morning, Masami sat at the table in a simple, comfortable yukata and watched Kyoya prepare breakfast. He had gotten better at cooking while she was away. His knowledge of what was currently available in the fridge certainly surpassed hers at this point in time.

Experimentally, she reached out with a tendril of Cloud Flame and ‘poked’ him like she never would have considered doing to one of the Varia Clouds. While great for practicing techniques and sparring, the Varia Compound wasn’t exactly the best place for any kind of friendly Flame Interaction.

Kyoya’s shoulders twitched subtly, and though he didn’t look away from the stove, she got back the equivalent of a gentle boop to the nose, a familiar admonishment from a big brother to his misbehaving little sister before she had learned to hide that mischief away.

(Sometimes, she wondered who she would have been if Rika hadn’t taught her to be the way she was. The answer every time was dead, so that train of thought never went anywhere.)

Masami smiled, completely genuine for once, sitting in her childhood home with the sunlight falling lightly over the kitchen table. Kyoya’s Flames were familiar and comforting on a deep, instinctual level. She must have subconsciously felt them her entire life, even while Flame Inactive.

He was, as could only be expected, an enormously powerful Cloud, but one that would shelter and hide her away if she needed it. His reach spread far and wide, but she felt no need to clash against him for her own space. Their claimed Territories were rarely in conflict, after all, which explained how they had lived together for so many years without fighting.

It was an exceedingly rare situation amongst two young, powerful Clouds, Satoshi had once explained to her, and their parents had been greatly relieved when their two children had shown no signs of wanting to tear each other apart.

(They had only really started fighting when outside stressors had pushed Kyoya into trying to nudge his sister deeper into his Territory for her protection, which had only unavoidably violated her own Territory until she was forced to leave.)

Thinking about it, Masami was somewhat surprised at how…composed Kyoya’s Flames felt, even with so many intruders on his Territory, She would have expected him to be more feral and restless, especially with the situation as uncertain as it was.

Curious, she tilted her head, chin cradled by her open palms. She ‘poked’ him again and got an annoyed sigh this time. “Not while I’m cooking, Masami.”

She pouted, all of her guards down for a rare, precious moment. Perhaps it was the warmth of her childhood lingering in these walls; perhaps it was being back under her brother’s protection after months outside. Rika wasn’t here to reprimand her, and Kyoya had already seen her at her most immature (literally her baby years).

Here, now, Masami could afford to be an immature, bratty, spoiled younger sibling for just long enough to earn another long-suffering sigh and a physical boop to the nose when Kyoya carried the pot of fried rice to the table. He was probably missing those carefree, halcyon years, too, to indulge her so.

“Eat first,” Kyoya said, far softer than he would with anyone else. “And then you can investigate.”

Masami giggled. “Hai, Onii-san.”

Kyoya’s Bond with Tsunayoshi was obvious if you knew to look for it. Tsunayoshi’s Sky Flames were bright and welcoming with an undertone of fierce protective strength, gently smoothing out any agitation in Kyoya’s Cloud Flames and crooning reassurance of his place in the pack.

How…interesting.

Bright and shining Tsunayoshi might be, but his Flames were comfortably room temperature at best. And as she had always suspected, Masami, who was cold down to her bones but perfectly comfortable in the dark, would have been a terrible match as an Element.

“You always saw Tsunayoshi-san as beneath you,” Masami stated with the lilt of a question, cuddled up to Kyoya on the engawa and staring at the koi pond. Their koi, at least, were unchanged and as fat as ever.

Kyoya petted her hair, for once falling straight and dark down her back with no hair ornaments to be seen. “He finally showed me his grown fangs. He’s becoming a true omnivore, able to devour all in his path.”

“Even though he comes with a crowd?”

“...it’s not awful to go hunting as a pack now that they have all sharpened their fangs,” Kyoya conceded reluctantly.

“Hmm. Then…what does it feel like to have a Sky?”

“Are you considering that scarred carnivore?”

“One version of me in the universe chose him. I’m…thinking about it.”

“Hn.” Kyoya thought about it for a moment. “It feels…like this house in the shape of a person. Like a second den.”

What a nice thought. Still, Masami hesitated.

“The small animal waited for me to offer. If your scarred carnivore is worthy of you, he will do the same.”

Although they might prefer it, Kyoya and Masami couldn’t stay hidden in their den forever. They had responsibilities their younger selves didn’t, obligations to other people outside of their own small family pack. They could and did spend the morning together, but they had an appointment to meet in the afternoon.

Kyoya padded into his baby sister’s room after putting on a black and formalized version of his usual Disciplinary Committee uniform that the baby had given him. He would have refused on principle, but the omnivore had broken out the puppy-eyes.

At least the material was comfortable and flexible. His movements wouldn’t be restricted in a fight.

Masami was sitting in front of her vanity, dressed in the clothes that she had arrived in. He hadn’t missed the subtle homage to their Clan Kamon and was debating getting a pin himself. She had an array of wisteria-patterned kanzashi spread before her and was twisting her hair into one of the more complicated styles that Rika had taught her.

Kyoya wandered over and picked a hairpin up. Exquisite, high-quality silk flowers dangled from solid steel, the end sharp enough to slice through bone. It was excellent craftsmanship.

“A gift,” Masami murmured. “From Lussuria-san.”

Hmph. At least her new pack was properly looking after her. He handed the kanzashi over when she held out an open palm and watched as she slid it in place. Finally, she picked up her gussen from the vanity and turned to smile at him, poised and serene once more, any hint of rare vulnerability hidden away once more.

That was fine. Kyoya and the walls of the Hibari Manor would keep her secrets for her so the outside scavengers saw nothing but the carnivore she was and knew to fear her fangs.

“Shall we go, Onii-san?”

Tsuna tried not to fidget in his seat or tug at the uncomfortable tie around his neck. He wasn’t used to three-piece-suits, but he guessed he’d better start. Everyone here was in some version of formal wear, even the Varia.

(Although they were just wearing their usual uniforms with a few black ties thrown on, which was apparently close enough to skate by. Smart. Tsuna wished he’d thought of that.)

They were all gathered in one of the big hotel meeting rooms, sitting around a huge U-shaped desk. Vongola Nono and his Guardians sat in the middle, the Varia were on the right side, and Tsuna and his Guardians were on the left. Reborn stood nonchalantly by the door. Everyone was here…but, well…

“They’re late,” Nono’s Storm and Right-Hand, Nougat, groused, a vein visibly pulsing on his forehead.

Tsuna tried not to sweatdrop. Kyoya and Masami still hadn’t arrived yet, and it was five minutes past the arranged meeting time. Even Lambo was here, and he was mostly already asleep in his chair, pacified by two bulging pockets of grape candy. Mukuro was eavesdropping through Chrome and already radiating distinct glee over this minor inconvenience to the famed Vongola.

He would tug on his Bond with Kyoya for a hint, but Kyoya had been sending strong Do-Not-Disturb vibes since yesterday evening, and, uhh, Tsuna still had some survival instincts, okay?

Tsuna peeked across the room at Xanxus and found him leaning back in a plush armchair — where did he even get the chance to find one!? — eyes closed and a glass of wine in his hand. Clearly, he couldn’t care less.

Vongola Nono looked at him with warm concern. “Tsunayoshi-kun…”

“Ah…let’s give them another five minutes,” Tsuna said, wincing when his voice came out on the timid side. He could feel Reborn’s pointed stare even without looking.

“Very well.” Nono leaned back and started eating one of the hotel-provided cookies.

Tsuna really tried not to facepalm.

The minutes ticked by agonizingly slowly. At his right, Hayato glared at the sole clock in the room like he could explode it with his mind, fingers clenched ominously over his trousers. At his left, Takeshi smiled like he didn’t have a care in the world, eyes glazed over and mind clearly elsewhere.

Tsuna looked at the ceiling and wondered why he had to deal with this.

At precisely four minutes and fifty-eight seconds, Nougat gritted out, “This cannot go on — ”

BANG!

Ah, of course. Tsuna was almost completely resigned to how his life was now. Everyone in the room naturally turned to look at the door, which had been unceremoniously kicked in, and there were the errant Clouds, Kyoya in front with his foot still raised.

…at least, Tsuna consoled himself, Kyoya was in a suit and had actually shown up.

Kyoya stalked into the room, already looking annoyed. From behind him, Masami stepped in and closed the door behind her.

She looked good, Tsuna thought. He couldn’t (and didn’t want to) remember the last time he saw her in person, but she was perfectly put-together, in a very Masami-version of the Varia uniform, maybe just a tad taller now, and her eyes were clear and bright above the veil of her black fan.

Tsuna couldn’t help but smile to see his friend so healthy and so herself. Masami met his gaze briefly and seemed to smile back, eyes curving at the ends.

“Hmph. So this is who we’ve been waiting for? I’m not impressed,” Nono’s Cloud, Visconti, growled, arms crossed, and oh look! There went Tsuna’s Hyper Intuition, shrieking in the back of his mind a second too late.

…oh no.

They had forgotten to account for what would happen with three Clouds in the same room.

Immediately, Kyoya and Masami turned in unison to look at Visconti, faces blank and movements eerily in sync. They were still standing close to the door, side by side, and Visconti was all the way across the room, by Nono.

Despite the distance, Tsuna could all but see the icy-cold killing intent pouring from each Cloud and clashing in the middle. The hairs on the back of his neck prickled as the atmosphere became suffocating, balanced on a razor-thin edge of violence. It made him want to go hide under his bed, but unfortunately, that had stopped being an option months ago.

If this continued on, things were going to devolve into a very destructive fight between three monstrously powerful Clouds very quickly. And the hotel would probably be leveled in the process. And no one would get anything done.

“Kyoya,” Tsuna pleaded. At the same time, Nono said quietly, “Visconti.” Xanxus overrode them all by firing a single shot into the ground at the midpoint and snarling, “Settle the fuck down, trash!”

Uhhh…

Baffled, Tsuna blinked at Nono and Xanxus and got a grandfatherly look of approval and an irritated scowl back. Was there…was there some sort of Cloud herding instinct that all Skies developed?

Whatever the trick was, it did seem to work. Visconti looked away with another mutter about “impudent youngsters”, and Kyoya huffed but strolled over to take his designated seat, shooting Tsuna a look that all but promised a biting later.

Tsuna held back a whimper.

Meanwhile, Masami did a strange but elegant fusion of a curtsy and a bow. If Tsuna ever tried that, he’d probably turn himself into a pretzel again, even now that he wasn’t as clumsy as before. She then floated vaguely in the direction of the Varia, settling herself against the wall behind Xanxus.

And with that, everyone was here and the meeting could finally begin.

…or not.

“Before we begin,” Nono said first, “I just want to start off by saying how proud I am of how far you’ve come, Tsunayoshi-kun. I’ve read every report that Reborn has sent me and heard glowing reviews from the Cavallone Boss and the Sky Arcobaleno.”

(Across the room, Xanxus rolled his eyes sky-high and scoffed under his breath. Vongola Nono’s Guardians scowled disapprovingly at him, only to meet the uncompromising glares of the Varia who surrounded him.)

Tsuna blinked at Nono, startled and a tad disbelieving. “Oh, umm, thank you, Vongola Nono.”

Nono’s Sky Flames pulsed through the room, old but powerful, trying to spread his Harmony in the most pervasive way that Tsuna had ever felt. What was he even trying to do? Everyone here was either Bonded to a Sky or claimed by one at least for the duration of this meeting. Future Dino had impressed upon Tsuna that Skies using their Flames on other Skies and their Own was a big no-no in the Mafia, very much a ‘keep your hands to yourself’ kind of deal.

Surely, Vongola Nono would know that so what was this supposed to be? Did he think that just because everyone here was supposedly ‘Vongola’ that he had this right? Tsuna held back a grimace and quickly drew on his own Flames to surround everyone here who was his in a safe bubble, denying contact from any potential poaching Skies.

It reminded him unpleasantly of how his father had behaved the last time he was home — during the Ring Battles — just spreading his Flame out across the whole house without any regard to Tsuna or the kids or even Mom, who was still in the dark about the Mafia. Lambo and I-Pin had complained the entire time that the foreign Sky Flames were itchy and uncomfortable and clung to Tsuna, who hadn’t felt much better and hadn’t had the ability back then to shield his own either. Reborn had made sure they had all spent as much time outside as possible.

“Please, you can just call me Grandpa,” Nono said with a kind smile, appearing not to notice the subtle rebuff but drawing his Flames back a little anyway. A test? Or was this just how he conducted meetings until a Sky told him otherwise? “It’s what you did when you were young.”

Tsuna stared, genuinely speechless for a second. He really hadn’t planned on bringing this topic up today, because they had bigger things to worry about, but what exactly was he supposed to say to that?

Hayato and Takeshi pressed their shoulders to his, a familiar gesture of reassurance, and their solid presences finally brought words to his tongue, despite the ringing in his ears and the heat growing in his chest. “You mean it’s what I did before you Sealed me.”

The room went dead silent.

Xanxus’ boot broke the silence at last with a loud thump on the carpet when he uncrossed his legs and sat up straight for the first time since he’d arrived. He looked at Tsuna, and he could feel the Wrath Flames rising up to meet his Sky even with the distance between them.

“What did you say, trash?” Xanxus said, dangerously soft, quieter than Tsuna had ever heard him, lethal as an unsheathed dagger in the dark.

Tsuna gulped but lifted his chin and refused to be cowed. “Vongola Nono came with my father and Sealed me when I was four years old after he found me with active Sky Flames. I’ve been recovering from that incident for the past ten years.”

“Tsunayoshi-kun…” Nono whispered, having the audacity to sound sad.

Xanxus stared at Tsuna for a second more, his Flames licking the air, tasting the truth in his words. Then, he turned to look at his so-called father and started roaring with laughter, slapping his armrest, bitter and mad and vindicated. “HAHAHA, I can’t believe you pulled the same bullshit twice, old man!”

Vicious scars appeared on Xanxus’ face, stretching down his neck, the proof of Nono’s abuse. “Sealing a potential Vongola Heir and ruining their life for a fucking whole-ass decade!? Twice! TWICE! HAHAHA, I REALLY HAVE TO GIVE IT TO YOU, YOU TWO-FACED OLD MAN! I never could have imagined your fucking hypocrisy went THIS FUCKING FAR!”

“Xanxus…” Nono said, in the same Kami-damned tone, looking old and tired and regretful, a decade too late.

“My, my,” Lussuria twittered, hand on his cheek but cold murder radiating from his usually lively Flames, “Sealing an active baby Sky…even the Varia aren’t quite that cruel. You could have just arranged a hit, Vongola Nono, wouldn’t that have been so much easier?”

“Shut up!” Nougat barked, bristling protectively over his Sky. “You dare speak when you know nothing of Nono’s conflict and agony over the decisions that he’s had to make!?”

“Yes.” Tsuna almost couldn’t recognize his voice when it came out, cold and steady, like he was already in Hyper Dying Will Mode. He stood up, vaguely aware of his Guardians falling suit, Lambo almost falling off his chair before Chrome scooped him up in her arms. For once, he had no forgiveness to offer at this table. “I do dare. I dare when it’s my life he ruined, creating Discord in every relationship I’ve had since I was four years old, creating Discord in myself! I couldn’t think, I couldn’t walk, I couldn’t even ask for help, and I was four! I didn’t even know why I was Dame!”

“It wasn’t until I met a powerful enough Cloud willing to help that I was able to even start wearing away at the Seal and have any semblance of a life. And it wasn’t until Reborn arrived to awaken my Dying Will that I could Harmonize with my Elements like I always should have been able to as a Sky! I dare, because Lussuria-san is right, and you should have just killed me if you could find the resolve to Seal me!” Distantly, Tsuna realized that he was now standing in front of Nono, hands slammed onto the desk, shouting with the full force of his grief and pain, his friends steady and reassuring at his back.

Vongola Nono stared up at him, hands trembling where he clasped them in front of him. He was pale, lines etched deep at the corners of his mouth and high on his forehead. “I have no excuses to offer, Tsunayoshi-kun. It was my mistake. Even if Iemitsu…no, there can be no justification for what I did. I’m deeply sorry for the pain I have caused.”

Tsuna looked at him dispassionately and felt nothing but empty inside. “It’s not enough. It’ll never be enough,” he proclaimed and saw Nono break a little inside to be rejected by his last Heir. But —

“That’s not what we’re here for.” Tsuna took a deep breath and turned to head back towards his seat, every last one of his Guardians following without a hitch. Hayato pulled back his chair for him, and Takeshi pressed a supporting hand to his back before nudging him in.

Tsuna sat down and took another deep breath before looking back up. Xanxus was openly staring at him, something sharp and newly considering in his gaze, his Flames twisted around him and possessively spread over his Guardians as Tsuna had done himself.

Over his Guardians but only peripherally touching Masami, just enough to keep Nono’s Flames off of her but cautious in a way that indicated she hadn’t given him permission for any other liberties.

His oldest friend, his savior though he hadn’t fully realized the magnitude at the same, still had her fan obscuring half her face, but her eyes were steely and hard when they met his for half a second before flickering away to check on Xanxus.

Nono was slumped in his seat, defeat in every line of his body. His Storm and Sun fussed over him, but his Cloud was standing at the window, back to his Sky. His Mist and Rain stood off to the side, pointedly looking away. His Lightning, younger than the rest, was also frowning, a look of disappointment on his face. So not even all of his Guardians had known. How ironic, how pitiful, that Nono had known that his own Guardians would disagree with his decisions and therefore decided to hide it instead of rethinking whether or not he was making the right ones. If Tsuna ever stooped to that level, Mukuro might as well go through with possessing him.

Still standing guard by the door, Reborn’s fedora shadowed his eyes, his mouth set in a frown. He glanced up when he felt Tsuna looking at him and gave him a single nod, approval and agreement all in one. Though old friends with Nono, Reborn was firmly on Tsuna’s side this time.

Tsuna was still angry. Furious and resentful as he had been since the first time Reborn had sat him down in that distant future and explained why his Flames had been acting the way they were and what had happened to him in tense, curt words. But he had arranged this meeting to discuss other things, and this topic would keep until Vongola Nono was in his own coffin, so.

“Enough,” Tsuna said. “Let’s talk about the Inheritance Ceremony.”

Nono closed his eyes and visibly pulled himself together, straightening up in his chair but looking older and more tired than ever. “As you wish, Tsunayoshi-kun.”

“First things first. Why are we conducting the Ceremony so early?” Tsuna demanded. “I was told that it should be when I’m eighteen years old.”

Nono managed a weak chuckle. “I’m an old man, and as you so clearly pointed out, well past my time. It may be a little early, but I’m confident that you and your Guardians are ready to lead the Vongola as the Tenth Generation.”

…yeah, no, it didn’t sound any more believable the second time around. Tsuna didn’t even have to say so himself.

Xanxus scoffed again, louder and harsher this time. “As if, old man. If that was the reason, you should have stepped down for me ten fucking years ago. The real reason is because you’re scared shitless of me and mine.”

Nono frowned sternly. “Now, Xanxus, I understand your rage but — ”

“YOU UNDERSTAND NOTHING, YOU SCUM!” Xanxus shouted, slamming his fist into his armrest with a bang. “YOU’RE NEVER SATISFIED WITH ANYTHING I DO! YOU JUST WANT ANY EXCUSE TO PUT ME BACK ON THE ICE, DON’T YOU!?”

“Xanxus…”

It had sounded awful the first time that Tsuna had heard it, and it still sounded awful now. How was it that every single Mafia father that he’d ever heard of was, to borrow Xanxus’ catchphrase, trash? Takeshi’s dad didn’t count. “Is it true?” Tsuna asked directly before the guns came out.

Nono heaved a put-upon sigh and turned to appeal to him, “Tsunayoshi-kun, I only want to ensure your succession without any problems. Xanxus’ resentment is my fault, and I don’t want more of my mistakes to affect your reign.”

Tsuna stared. Was this what happened when you stayed in the Mafia for too long? You started to believe your own lies, even without a Mist’s help? “Do you even have any evidence to back up your suspicions?”

“I’m sure you’ve heard of the Vongola Intuition — ”

“So no,” Xanxus tsked and sprawled back in his seat, anger withdrawing for an aged, dark bitterness that was even more painful to witness, that felt terribly familiar to his own. “You never change, you senile old man.”

Tsuna looked back and forth between the two warring Skies. He needed to tread carefully here or risk alienating both. “From my interactions with Xanxus-san, his absolute loyalty is to the Family,” he said. “I really don’t think this is necessary.”

Nono directed an indulgent (patronizing) smile at him. “That’s very kind of you. It’s this exact spirit that will lead the Vongola back to what it should be, back to what Primo originally wanted. But I’ve known Xanxus since he was a boy. I know best his ambition and pride. Please believe that I want only what is healthy for the Family.”

“WHY YOU!” Squalo, who had been vibrating in place this entire time, finally snapped and raised his sword. Tsuna was kind of surprised that it had taken this long.

“Shut up!” Xanxus barked before anyone else could react. “You don’t have the right to talk here, you shitty shark!”

Although he had only singled out Squalo…Tsuna thought that those words might be directed at all of his Guardians, who were all either just as restless as Squalo or deathly still, incensed on their Sky’s behalf and more than ready to start a fight.

(Masami, he noticed, was the only one who didn’t have a visible reaction. But Tsuna knew that didn’t mean she wasn’t affected.)

A good Sky, trying to protect his Elements, his Intuition twinged, and that decided him.

“Okay,” Tsuna said and sensed the screaming tension wind up another notch, too many eyes snapping around to scrutinize his every twitch. He ignored it, Flame rising with his resolve. “I might not know Xanxus-san as well as you, Vongola Nono, but I do know the Varia Cloud Officer.”

Every head turned to look at Masami, who looked back serenely over the edge of her fan, unperturbed.

“Masami,” Tsuna said, smiling at her with warm orange-shaded eyes full of trust, letting his guard down entirely in this room full of potential enemies because this was to make a point, “is Xanxus-san planning a coup against me?”

Masami blinked slowly back at him before kicking off from the wall she had been leaning on and snapping her fan shut with a sharp sound. If she was angry that he had addressed her without an honorific or put her on the spot, no one could tell. “No,” was the simple reply.

“Do you promise?”

“Yes.”

Without a second of hesitation, Tsuna nodded and turned to Nono with a beaming smile, sparkles twinkling cheerfully around him (probably Mukuro’s doing, his petty Mist). “See, Nono. Everything is fine. You can stop hassling the Varia now.”

“...”

Half of Nono’s Guardians and the Varia face-planted into the ground. And then came the loud cries of protest.

“ARE YOU AN IDIOT!?” Nougat demanded with furious disbelief. “You would believe his own Officer, just like that!?”

“Oi!” Hayato flared up, free to finally express his own irritation at the situation now that it wasn’t a Sky-to-Sky conversation. “You think you can talk to Juudaime like that!?”

“He’s nothing but an insolent naive brat!”

“Shishishi, I can’t believe that’s all it took.”

“Nono, we can’t possibly trust that — ”

BANG!

“Anyone,” Kyoya’s voice cut clean through the sudden silence, deceptively calm even though he had just slammed a single tonfa hard onto the floor. He lounged lazily in his seat, leg over his knee, but abruptly surrounded by a terrifying aura of sheer bloodlust and Cloud Flames, “who doubts my imouto’s word, doubts mine.” He bared his teeth, pressing down on the tonfa until it started making a visible dent in the floorboards (that Tsuna would undoubtedly have to deal with later), despite the fact that he really shouldn’t have been able to casually exert that much force in his current position. “And anyone who offends us both, offends the Hibari Clan. Do you dare?”

Silence.

Tsuna…didn’t even know there was a Hibari Clan, much less one both powerful enough and influential enough that the Mafia-born here instantly recognized the name. He would have to ask Kyoya later. For now — “I trust Masami and Kyoya with my life,” he said into the stillness with the authority of simple fact. “If they say Xanxus-san is loyal, then he is. If I’m to be Vongola Decimo, my first act won’t be to condemn a loyal member of my Family on nothing but suspicion and paranoia.”

This time, Tsuna actively let his Sky Flames rise and expand outwards, careful to keep his touch light but firm, pushing Nono’s own Flames back completely until it was confined to his side of the room, as it should have been from the start. He made sure not to touch Xanxus’ Flames at all since that was common Flame Etiquette. Safe and strong in the heat of his resolve, he stared into Nono’s wide eyes and challenged, “That is my Will. Do you accept it?”

And Vongola Nono bowed his head at last. “...as you will it, Decimo.”

“Good. We’ll go forward with the Ceremony since it’s already been announced, but the Varia should be treated as part of Vongola since they are.” Tsuna let his Flame simmer back down but didn’t relax. Clearly, all these old geezers respected was power, not common sense, or you know, any kind of basic humanity. “With that settled, let’s discuss the Simon Family.”

“Tsuna.” To his surprise, it was Reborn who interrupted him this time. When he turned to look curiously at his tutor, Reborn pointed out the window. “It’s getting late. Why don’t we discuss that tomorrow?”

“Ehhh?” Tsuna gaped at the red and magenta streaked sky outside. “It’s sunset already!?” Mom would be expecting them back for dinner soon! And the last thing he wanted was for whatever this was to follow him back home. Wait, Lambo’s bedtime! And handling the sugar rush from all that candy! No, no, no, no, time to wrap it up!

(“Wow, he immediately became a wimpy brat again,” Lussuria whispered, a hand covering his mouth.

Xanxus snorted and slouched back in his chair. “...typical.”)

Filled with frantic energy, Tsuna got to his feet and clapped his hands with a forced grin. “Reborn’s right! Let’s reconvene tomorrow. Oh, um, but I really only need to talk about the Simon Family with the Varia since they’re in charge of security at the Ceremony, right?

Making shooing motions at his Guardians behind his back until they got with the program and got up with him, Chrome carrying a completely conked-out Lambo, Tsuna slid his way unsubtly to the door that Reborn was already holding open as he rambled. “Please don’t feel forced to stay here, Vongola Nono, you said your health is fragile and we wouldn’t want you to get sick! I’ll see you back in Italy for the Ceremony soon, hope you enjoyed your stay and have a safe trip back! Great meeting, everyone, thanks and bye!”

Tsuna executed the worst bow he’d ever made (no doubt to Masami’s well-hidden horror) and promptly left a trail of dust and a roomful of shocked individuals behind him, his Guardians following him at varying paces.

“...” The Ninth Generation said.

“They had the right idea,” Xanxus decided, standing up with a stretch and a yawn. “Time to go, trash. Have a ‘safe flight’, old man.” He didn’t hold back a snigger as he prowled out, the other Varia right behind him, each with their own mocking smirk or glance.

“What the fuck just happened?” Ganauche wondered.

“Reborn, what have you been teaching that kid!?” Croquant asked, all but dissociating out of his skin as a Mist was wont to do when encountering unpleasant things.

Reborn jumped onto the table with ease, landing right in front of Nono. “I can’t take all the credit,” he said. “Masami and Byakuran were a big help.”

“I didn’t know our future Decimo would be so emotionally compromised by one of Xanxus’,” Schnitten said with a scowl. “Is that really wise? She only had to say two words to completely turn him.”

“The Cloud willing to help Tsuna when he was struggling under the Seal was Hibari Masami. Even if she’s not his Cloud, Tsuna will always trust her like he would any of his Guardians.” Reborn paused and then warned, “He won’t tolerate any attack on her. Nor the Varia now.”

“Good. That’s…good,” Nono murmured.

Nougat startled. “Nono?”

Nono turned to look thoughtfully out the window. “Such a strong connection between the Main House and the Varia is perhaps just what the Vongola needs. Everything that Tsunayoshi-kun showed us today proves that he is the right choice for Decimo.” And then, to everyone’s surprise, he smiled widely despite that absolute catastrophe of a meeting. “Thank you, Reborn. I can leave the Vongola and Xanxus in Decimo’s safe hands. Come, let us return to Italy. We must tell the staff to prepare for their new Don.”

Xanxus broke down howling with laughter as soon as they got back to their hotel suite. “Did you — did you see that old man’s face!? He looked like he got smacked with a dead fish! Fuck, it’s been so long since I’ve seen anyone put him in his place like that!”

Squalo rolled his eyes but brushed his Flame lightly against his Sky anyway, happy to share in his rare joy. “Not since Vongola Ottavio was with us, right?”

“Damn straight!” Chortling, Xanxus dragged himself up right and wiped tears of laughter from his eyes. “Trash, you better have gotten all that on tape.”

“Mou, right here, Boss.” Mammon held out a recorder smugly. “I won’t even charge per watch.” And that was saying something from the miser.

“Shishishi, the Prince was greatly entertained.” Bel tucked his hands behind his head with his signature grin, kicking back on the sofa. “That video will be a worthy addition to movie night.”

“I didn’t expect Sawada to stand up for us like that,” Levi commented. “Does he have some ulterior motive? Should we check it out, Boss?”

Xanxus snorted, waving a hand dismissively. “That trash? He has his whole fucking heart out on his sleeve. Wouldn’t understand an ulterior motive if it bit his blabbering head off. Didn’t you feel his Flame back there?”

As if any of them could have missed it. “He’s much stronger now,” Lussuria said, cocking his head and re-fluffing his fur hem fussily. “Must be that trip to the future. Still want to challenge him, Boss?”

Xanxus narrowed his eyes in thought, Wrath Flames twisting in the same volcanic defiance, ambition, and rage that had first brought Squalo to his knees to swear, certain that this man would bend the world to his Will or burn it all down. If his Sky wanted to move against that soft civilian boy and his little friends again, Squalo would follow without question.

Even if Lussuria was right, and Sawada really was much stronger, his Sky Flames the purest and brightest that Squalo had ever felt (Xanxus’ was still the strongest and fiercest, of course). His Guardians, too, their Flames staunch and unwavering, a fully fledged Sky Court united in purpose and strength. Each and every one had killed in defense of their Sky and each other and were willing to kill again. Squalo knew the look; it was night and day in comparison to the hesitant, untried children they had fought against in the Ring Battles.

Still, they were Varia Quality. They would find a way.

But then, Xanxus blew out a breath and lifted his head to stare at the hotel ceiling with a tired twist to his mouth, Flames simmering back down to a familiar still lake of molten lava. “Nah. If he’s willing to go against the old man for his beliefs, then let him have it. Reminds me of Enrico, just a bit.”

…Enrico Fermi? The oldest son of Nono, the man Xanxus had acknowledged and looked up to as a big brother for half of his life? That was…

“Besides.” His gaze shifted to the side, to the girl standing next to the door who had stayed silent this entire time, hiding behind her fan as usual. “You’d go against us if we moved against that baby Sky, wouldn’t you?”

Masami stared back evenly, serene grey eyes giving away nothing. “I staked my own word and honor on this matter,” she said, soft but about as yielding as the sharp edge of his blade. “My brother invoked the Clan to back me up. I would…dearly hope to not be proven a liar.”

Yeah, of course she fucking would. Squalo scrutinized their wayward Cloud closely. He had been surprised that she had been willing to do that actually, given how hard she had been fighting Harmonizing with Xanxus. She didn’t even call him Boss for fuck’s sake. Not something Squalo had been sticking his nose in; he knew better than to interfere in a Sky-Element courtship. For her to throw her own lot in with them at the most crucial time, maybe it was going better than he’d thought?

Or maybe she was just acting like a contrary-ass cat like Clouds liked to do. Who fucking knew — not Squalo.

Xanxus just hmphed and looked away to brace his feet on the table now relegated to footrest. “I don’t need to do anything. He can fly or die on his own goddamned time. I just need some wine and steak to watch the show. Oi, shitty shark! Call room service, it’s dinner time.”

Squalo would follow Xanxus to the end of the world and straight into hell with minimum complaining. But sometimes, he really wanted to strangle his Sky. “I’M NOT YOUR FUCKING SERVER, YOU SHITTY BOSS!”