Archive of Our Own

So to be honest, a conventional love story this is not.

To be perfectly honest, “love story” might even be a bit of a misnomer.

See, the crux of the problem is this: Love is, for all practical intents and purposes, best identified as that enthusiastic dose of affection between individuals; that beatific feeling of mutual like; that ebullient potential for a fantastically torrid romance. Il Amore. L’Amour. El Amore. It is the endorphins-glazed stuff pubescent girls lap up by the dozen-fluid ounces and do extraordinarily stupid things for, by the power of, in the name of, so help them god.

Love, as it is defined by the Merriam-Webster Dictionary (see entry: \ˈləv\ noun. “warm attachment, enthusiasm, or devotion”), plays the part of an absentee here. It has, for all practical intents and purposes, quite kindly fucked off into the literary aether.

This is not a bad thing by any means. There is still plenty of enthusiasm to go around—enthusiasm to beat another until concentrated fruit juice is leaking from every unclogged orifice. There’s devotion too—though some would insist that it was more of the borderline illegal sort (and why not just call it “stalking” to be fair).

It’s only the warm, fuzzy feelings that are missing, really.

Purists and linguists alike may argue that such false advertisement is reprehensibly misleading. They may insist that such disrespect does nothing but cheapen the ideologically sacred concept. And they may even have a point.

Alas, and for shame.

In all seriousness though, “vaguely obsessive and somewhat stalker-friendly story” just simply doesn’t sound as good as “love story.”

And in the end, the gist is the same anyway.

So say it begins with something like this:

Boy gets picked up by a group of malcontents. Assume the group is mafia. Assume the group is as ambitious as can be for all the wrong reasons. Assume the Boy gets misused by said mafia in ways that would goad most human rights activists into fits of frothing-at-the-mouth rage.

Boy deals with his existentialist angst. Boy does so by going on a killing spree.

Boy ends up with a huge chip on his shoulder, go figure, and makes a shit-list that he tends to quite religiously, for all that he isn’t religious. But it’s not enough; never enough. Boy never does things by halves.

Give the Boy a few years. Boy ultimately decides to bring the funeral to the Sicilian network’s backyard from the inside-out. Boy figures it best to start some shit on some Other Boy’s turf to get the ball rolling. Not surprisingly, Other Boy doesn’t take it too kindly when shit is started on the sanctity of his grounds and blindly sets out to bite a bitch.

Boy meets Boy.

Boy lures the Other Boy into his parlour, makes a gamely attempt to woo the Other Boy with really pretty flowers and tattered upholstery, and—oh, yes—apparently out-of-season plants can be just as effective as date rape drugs. Who would have thought?

Somehow it ends like this:

Other Boy gets over his roofie’d by vegetation problem and manages to bite the bitch dead. For his troubles, Other Boy also enlists a creeper’s feathery little helper into the practical service of Namimori.

Boy doesn’t fare as well, gets his ass sort of kicked, and is hauled off by the representatives of a mafia-run penitentiary system.

Boys don’t meet again for a very long time.

There’s a continuation though.

(“They still found each other interesting” is putting it nicely.)

The decision to spring free the less trustworthy and infinitely more insidious half of Vongola’s Mist Guardianship happens approximately one year after Sawada Tsunayoshi finally claims his birthright with his predecessor’s blessing. Any earlier would have only resulted in a grand orchestration of failure and Reborn had been nothing if not thorough in beating most that out of his protégé.

And Tsuna had waited. He first waited patiently for the ceremonies and the formalities to pass. Then he waited some more for the first wave of assassination attempts to die down. Only when he was reasonably sure that he was no longer ranked “Number One Most Likely to be Assassinated By Stepping Out the Front Door,” did he round up his consigliere and his guardians for a little communal tête-à-tête.

One particular guardian would have completely ignored the summons though, had Reborn not been pre-emptively dispatched as a proxy. Which is why Hibari finds himself being pulled aside a few days prior to the actual meeting date by Reborn who casually informs him of the forecasted agenda: Rokudo, a possible prison break, Mukuro, a possible chance for a rematch, and oh yes, something about Rokudo Mukuro—you remember Rokudo Mukuro, don’t you?

It’s an irresistible lure for someone like Vongola’s Cloud.

(Of course he bites.)

When Hibari arrives at Tsuna’s office suite days later, he is alone and just late enough to avoid the others arriving en masse. Technically this makes him the last attendee to arrive, much to Gokudera’s bitten-off vocalizations of displeasure, but he still somehow manages to commandeer an entire triplet of chairs all to himself.

Looking around the long, oblong table, it’s easy to pick out those who have some sort of inkling as to what the meeting aims to cover and those who don’t:

The Mist girl is quietly ecstatic, her hope a painful, tangible thing. She exchanges looks with Hibari for a brief moment and the amount of cautious optimism in her carriage and brightly glittering eye is absurd. When Hibari narrows his own gaze in response, she frowns back defiantly, turning away only when the lights dim seconds later and Tsuna begins to speak.

Hibari quirks an eyebrow at her profile, but remains, for the most part, unimpressed.

Another cursory glance around the room suggests that Chrome’s fortifying enthusiasm has not quite caught on with the rest of the herd. At least, not so much from the looks of the miniature ash-and-filter, neo-modernist sculpture sitting in front of Tsuna’s chain-smoking lapdog. But it is also obvious that Gokudera had practically put together the presentation himself, if the painfully professional graphic design with its immaculate lines and typeface choices are of any indication.

“Thank you all for coming here on such short notice,” Tsuna says, face aglow from the projector screen’s soft illumination. He offers the room a small smile and steadfastly ignores Hibari’s unimpressed sneer and Reborn’s running counsel on how good mafia leaders “should always get to the point.”

“Now, I know a lot of you won’t like what I’m about to propose and most of you probably won’t agree with the logic behind it anyway,” he continues, “but please keep in mind that I’ve been considering this for quite a while now.”

Hibari props his head against a fist and yawns just as Tsuna gives Gokudera a subtle go-ahead. An impressively stark and ugly rock wall, dotted with curiously uniform holes which may or may not have constituted as windows, replaces the title card.

“I’m sure all of you are at least somewhat familiar with the Vendicare Prison and the Vindice,” Tsuna says, nodding in time with each following transitional image of the fortress and its suspiciously non-human keepers.

Hibari looks on, unimpressed at the virtual tour. He blinks slowly at the progression from exterior to interior and idly contemplates the merits of closing his eyes against the tedious parade of heavily manned entrances and dimly lit corridors.

“Okay, so one thing I’m sure everybody has noticed by now,” Tsuna flourishes out a pocket laser pointer, “is that Vendicare Prison’s facilities are very high-tech.” The little orange dot flickers over the tell-tale installations of military-grade restraints and consoles. “Unfortunately,” he adds, “they’re also notably unhygienic.”

“That’s a patch of Stachybotrys chartarum by the way,” Gokudera points out helpfully and scowls when nobody reacts. “Toxic fungal growth,” he clarifies. Again, no reaction. “Black mold? Oh for fuck’s sake, it’s shit that’s bad for you.”

Security layouts and poisonous mushrooms. So this is why they had asked to borrow Hibird’s infiltration services some odd months ago at the non-negotiable rate of 200 Euros per day of service and 50 Euros per photo taken. Hibari lifts his head up off his hand to consider the medical charts juxtaposed with the high-resolution photos of Vendicare’s holding cells. They were, indeed, quite dingy. And the irony of just how similar the prison interior looked to Kokuyoh’s scornful state of disrepair when Mukuro had first shown up like the persistent cockroach he was—is—makes Hibari’s upper lip curl ever-so-slightly over his teeth.

(Nobody faults Lambo who, despite the empty seat between him and the sudden spike in killing intent, jerks up at that very moment and relocates to a new spot, five chairs away.)

“As I was saying, these conditions are obviously problematic and can’t possibly be good for anybody’s well-being.”

The images of the dank and depressing hallways cut to a single close-up of an isolated holding cell inhabited by a lanky figure, oxygen mask obscuring half his face whilst suspended completely submerged in an aqueous chamber.

Hibari scoffs at the pause taken then. Silly tactics favoured by silly people.

“Especially not for a member of the Vongola Family, no matter his or her crimes.”

When Tsuna pauses yet again, it’s to allow the rest of his audience a moment for the implications sink in. And the herd doesn’t disappoint, Yamamoto reacting quickest with an affirmation-seeking “PINEAPPLE?” pantomime followed by Ryohei’s loud exclamation upon finally recognising Mukuro floating in what pretty much constituted as a glorified vat of preservatives.

Meanwhile, Hibari takes the opportunity to work himself into a fine, murderous rage. A slow, acidic burn that pricks its way through his veins with each additional second Mukuro’s photograph remains up on the projector-screen. If asked, he’s more than ready to take the nearest available jet—Vongola, Varia, Cavallone, or even his own—to Vendicare and sever all of Mukuro’s life support himself.

He grinds his teeth, just audible enough for Lambo to hear, flinch, and lean away despite the distance already between them. It’s been five years after the fact, and the defeat by someone whose mere personal effects had violated the entirety of Namimori’s three-paged guidelines on appropriate appearances still rankles.

(He will drain him first, hang him on a clothesline by his toes to dry, and shave off that aesthetically displeasing and wholly illogical tuft of hair. Then he’ll bite him dead.

He’ll bite him dead twice. Just to be sure.)

The audible dissent within the confines of the room is minimal, more whispers of intrigue than those of mutiny. But the rest of the presentation is of no more concern to Hibari—least of all Tsuna’s other motives (such as “needing everybody available to ensure the successful execution of the master plan,” or something else equally offensive, pathetic, and not worth his time).

Apparently the Vongola Decimo never got the memo concerning the mafia and its ethical position on humanitarian acts, such as saving somewhat sociopathic illusionists from cryogenic-stasis induced health complications.

Hibari continues to frown his express distaste at all the free-flowing abundance of Mukuro’s long tresses on the projector screen as the rest of the reactionary hubbub dwindles down and Tsuna picks up where he’d previously left off. Reborn had promised him one thing to ensure his attendance. Hibari checks his watch, impatience growing.

He has places to be, research to collect, Hibirds to feed, and certain miscreants to dispose of.

“The main plan is already well underway; Gokudera will continue to accompany me during my meetings with the other Families while I argue our case. But in Mukuro’s best interest, we need to get him out as soon as possible. It has come to my attention that muscle atrophy is very common in, ah, holding-cells such as Mukuro’s. And it’s not like his jailors take him out on daily strolls or anything. So. This is where back-up comes in. Please keep in mind that this is only if the more diplomatic negotiations fall through, but is anybody willing to volunteer for a collaborative rescue operation with Mukuro’s group?”

Hibari blinks at the word “rescue,” but doesn’t linger on the semantics of Tsuna’s proposition.

There’s a momentary lull in the proceedings, but even that does not last.

It goes without saying that Hibari will join the so-called rescue operation. But rather than doing something as pointless as raising his hand like Ryohei, or even straightening in his seat like Chrome, he catches Tsuna’s eye with a very direct stare.

“Thank you Ryohei, Chrome, and”—Tsuna falters—”you too, Hibari-san? But I thought you—”

“Don’t presume to think. I have my reasons.” Hibari rises from his seat.

“What other possible reasons could you have you self-serving prick,” Gokudera growls from where he is also half-rising out of his seat, so ready to defend his owner.

Hibari ignores him, opting instead to pin Tsuna with a final close-mouthed imitation of a smile that only lab-tampered woodland animals could love, would love. “Send the details with Tetsu. You know how to reach me.”

He doesn’t stay long enough to see the growing alarm plant itself on Tsuna’s face.

He does manage to hear the tail-end of Reborn’s casual, “Try not to regret this,” though.

Days later, and the diplomatic negotiations don’t exactly fail per se; it’s more like they snag on a viciously insistent hangnail than actually fall apart.

In any case, Tsuna only needs two more Families to fall behind his case; two more Families to throw in their support of popping Rokudo Mukuro out of his watery cage. But while the Estraneo family hadn’t been particularly well-liked by its peers, the memory of its downfall lingers still. And to say that they had been without a single ally during their decline would be an exercise in ignorance.

“This isn’t working, Tenth,” Gokudera says. He shifts his weight from one foot to the other from behind his leader’s chair, the only sign of his frustration when another representative from the Ignoto Family takes the floor in strident tones, warning the assembly against heavily metaphorical dangers and biblical plagues.

“I know,” comes the terse reply some long, arduous heartbeats later.

Tsuna worries his inner cheek between his teeth and is ever aware of the weight of the cell phone in his inner breast-pocket. He needs all his Guardians on call, literally and figuratively, if his grand master plan to overhaul his Family’s modus operandi is to succeed even the tiniest bit during this lifetime.

But first things first.

Ideally, they would manage to gain a majority once the decision comes down to a vote. And, as Gokudera had previously noted, they had a problem.

He can’t really fault the dissenters their caution. Not really. Not when the Vongola themselves had been divided on the issue; still are, in fact. And if the Vongola were “uneasy,” then the other Families on the mailing list could be justifiably classified as “fucking worried.” Worried enough to fall back upon whatever constituted as mafia filibuster whenever the issue presented itself, so admirably determined in making sure no logical loophole existed in the original sentencing to help one Rokudo Mukuro walk free.

Yet, for all the religiosity upon which La Cosa Nostra often invokes its Lady Fortuna in matters of business, intrigue, and good-old murder, fortune remains ironic indeed.

Or perhaps fortune simply favours all that which has a tendency to send the Wheel of Rebirth careening off its axis.

In one life, Rokudo Mukuro saunters out through Vendicare’s entrance in the midst of an on-going war, charred debris lining his path and muscle atrophy laid low by illusions. In another, he is couriered away by his ever-loyal retinue on a stainless steel gurney lined with silk filched from Glo Xinia’s sumptuously decorated bedroom.

The fact of the matter is this: Nine times out of ten, Rokudo Mukuro escapes Vendicare with everything—limbs, wits, and glossy locks—intact. Even in the rare case where he doesn’t get out completely unscathed, Mukuro still manages to cheat his life-sentence while waving about a one-finger salute at the mafia as a whole.

And Tsuna knows this. Or rather, his intuition informs him enough that, in this life, he is the designated getaway driver.

“What do we do, Tenth?”

“They’re not being very subtle, are they?”

“Well, the crazy fucker didn’t really endear himself to them by single-handedly smearing one of their closest allies into a bloody afterthought on the patio.”

“There’s that,” Tsuna agrees before adding: “I’m afraid my Italian might be getting rusty. Did he just compare Mukuro to a swarm of locusts?”

“I think so. It’s a biblical reference.”

“Ah,” Tsuna says mildly. “Good to know.”

And it was, good to know. The repercussions would be messy; the backlash, epic. But thanks to Reborn, Tsuna could quite comfortably say that he’s been through much, much worse.

He slides his phone out before he could convince himself otherwise and hands it back to his right-hand man. Gokudera starts punching in the G-script code necessary to access the secure channel they used for mission purposes almost immediately.

“Remind Hibari that this is a rescue mission.”

“Yes, boss.”

“And could he please try to not actually kill anybody on his way in?”

The officious tapping slows, hesitates, and stops altogether. When Tsuna glances over in askance, Gokudera is looking doubtfully back at him.

“Forgive me, Tenth,” Gokudera says, “but remember Saigon?”

How could he forget Saigon. The mission where he’d dispatched Hibari with explicit instructions to follow, and somehow ended up with a small civil war broiling unpleasantly in his lap instead.

Tsuna considers this very excellent reminder.

“No, you’re right,” he says at last. “Just make the suggestion generic then, like, could he try to keep the maiming to a minimum.” He lays a hand on Gokudera’s arm. “I trust your judgement,” he adds very sincerely.

Gokudera is still looking mildly constipated when he excuses himself to make the call, but Tsuna will take his victories where he can get them.

As it turns out, however, Hibari doesn’t get the message until much, much later.

As it turns out, breaking into Vendicare Prison is a lot like taking candy from a baby. A baby who is fully capable of changing his own diapers, who fully appreciates the taste and texture of chilled limoncello on a hot summer afternoon like any good Italian liqueur connoisseur, and who is, in all actuality, a cursed hitman with a very fashionable penchant for tastefully feathered fedoras.

Come to think of it, that particular baby wouldn’t really allow his candy to be taken anywhere by anyone without his express permission anyway. He’d protect his candy as he would his authority: with a steady trigger-finger and what pretty much amounts to a portable all-in-one, change-on-demand arsenal.

Vendicare Prison isn’t actually manned by an army of well-dressed arcobalenos though, so that makes things a little easier.

(Hibari tries to not feel too disappointed at that.)

They send out Ryohei first with the very simple instruction to “go all out” tucked under his belt. Because if there is anything Vongola’s very own boxing expert excels in, it is creating twenty-first century craters the size of small parking lots with nothing but his fists and an extreme love for life.

Perfect, for loud, obnoxious, and almost excessively explosive distractions.

So while Ryohei wreaks merry havoc on the surrounding scenery just outside the prison grounds, the rest of the team has a grand old time bypassing the outer-most perimeters; incapacitating the mercenaries on guard duty at every other watch post; dismantling the automatics peering not-so-shyly from every crack and crevice in the fortress walls.

By the time they actually receive the call from Gokudera to commence Plan B, they’re already well within enemy territory and moving along at a nice, brisk pace.

“This is Chrome checking in; we’ve just breached the inner holding areas and are now proceeding along routes B, C, and E. We’re a little ahead of schedule, but—ah, could you repeat that? Why? Because the Cloud Guardian and Ken both insisted.”

Gokudera’s invectives blister across the signal’s transmission, and Hibari, prowling just a bit ahead and away from the potential crowding, turns off his headset with an air of absentminded annoyance.

“Alright. Affirmative. Yes, it’s best to not think about it… yes, I’ll be sure to remind him not to—no, I don’t think it’ll make much of a difference. I’ll pass along the message anyway, if that makes you feel any better.”

They all know she won’t, whatever the message may be. She hasn’t bothered trying again since the first mission together. After all, why bother when the recipient has heard it all before and makes it very clear where he thinks both sender and messenger can shove it?

But, for once, Hibari doesn’t snort his disdain, and Gokudera doesn’t question her reasonable intentions.

“We’re entering the lower level cells. Will report again when we’ve completed phase two. Chrome out.”

It should be worth mentioning that the mafia, like any other sprawling criminal collective, puts a premium on information above all else. In a way, information is valued the way a decorated sommelier values the fruits of the vine.

However, the mafia’s figurative grapevine doesn’t quite refer to the rolling Mediterranean vineyards from whence they came, but rather to the viciously efficient gossip system encouraged by the upper echelon’s enthusiasm for secrets and hearsay. It helps in particular that the capobastone and the consiglieri seem to have developed a reputation for gathering together weekly, like little old ladies trading stories and other choice tidbits over cookies and Chianti.

It’s a regular tea party with the lot—or so Tsuna is led to believe.

(He remembers, for instance, when Gokudera and Yamamoto came into his office just last week, arguing animatedly about pedigree and human husbandry of all things.

“Rufina gave birth again,” Yamamoto had reported, secretive and maybe just a tad too gleeful. “Nobody knows who the daddy is, but Stefano brought in this gigantic, what was it called?”

“Torta alla Monferrina.”

“That! He brought this gorgeous cake to the meeting anyway. And it was delicious! Sorry we couldn’t save you some, Tsuna, but if you ever want a puppy...”

“We’re worse than a knitting circle,” Gokudera confessed mournfully.)

So when news of the Vendicare break-in burns its way through the ranks at least a good solid hour ahead of schedule, Tsuna can’t find it in himself to be particularly surprised.

Resigned, yes. But not the least bit surprised.

“Vongola! What is the meaning of this? Explain yourself!”

Tsuna sighs. “Please calm yourself, Don Ignoto.”

By the time Gokudera returns to Tsuna’s side, the entire room is in the midst of having the most passive aggressive, most restrained uproar in recent mafia history.

Even Dino, who’d been previously supporting the Vongola the loudest, appears aghast.

“Please tell me that Vendicare is still standing. Lie if you have to,” Tsuna hisses from the corner of his mouth. It’s not exactly a plea because the don of the Vongola family does nothing of the sort. Rather he inquires in hushed tones, urgently and desperately.

Gokudera swallows around his pained expression, as if something large and spiny had lodged semi-permanently in his throat. “Well, the good news, for whatever definitions of, is that Hibari hasn’t actually killed anybody just yet…”

“The bad news is that they’re already at the extraction stage, and if Hibari gets his way, we might be getting Mukuro back more dead than alive.”

Beneath the weight of his respiratory mask, Mukuro smiles.

Phase two had been straightforward enough on paper:

Secure the target; exit premise with minimal disturbance; regroup at to-be-determined reconnaissance point.

But Hibari has his own plans; his own set of priorities. So he makes his revisions to the original document accordingly:

Terminate target; dump body elsewhere.

In all, it’s a much simpler, much less time-consuming approach to Tsuna’s endeavour, and Hibari suspects that there are quite a few countermeasures in place against his superior interpretations.

Not that any of them would be effective in any way.

They enter the antechamber together, he and Mukuro’s purportedly better half. They’ve worked together often enough that the instinct to neutralize the inherent threat she poses has become more of a subconscious insistence than anything more pressing. Something more like a mouse nibbling at his better judgment than a rat gnawing on his peace of mind.

No doubt Tsuna is hoping that her presence will act as some sort of moral deterrent.

The passage opens to a large, tepid room, lined with tanks all evenly spaced. Most are empty. The occupants in the few tanks don’t even seem to register their intrusion.

The air is damp and smells of wet steel and organic decay. A poorly lit nursery in an insect hive.

“Row six, tank nine,” Chrome says, reading off their intel without a hint of irony. She shrugs when Hibari slants a disbelieving look at her from the corner of his eye.

“The Vendicare has a poor sense of humour?”

His lip curls in disdain. It’s tempting to comment on the hive-mind of idiots everywhere, but he doesn’t. He’s feeling generous today.

“After you,” Chrome murmurs with a dainty sweep of her hand.

Hibari continues to eye her, suspicious, but he moves past her nonetheless. They go deeper into the chamber, past rows three, four, five, until he’s standing in front of row six, tank nine. It’s only when he’s gazing up at the once-familiar form of the man who has only occasionally plagued his dreams that the double prickle, one from the front and the other from where Chrome hovers, coalesce into one.

He moves closer. The single eye not sealed beneath tube and tape snaps open into a baleful blue stare as Hibari stops at the very edge of the watery cell.

They regard each other in hostile silence for what can only be a few seconds, but what feels like minutes, hours, a life-time. The years have not been kind to Mukuro. Muscle atrophy was inevitable, Hibari notes, eyes skittering over the sharp definition of bones shifting beneath pallid skin. He quashes the little flicker of disappointment at the flash of rib definition.

“Mukuro-sama.” Chrome is a soft exhalation of yearning when she joins him at the tank’s edge. She presses a hand to the glass and that single visible eye slides to regard her with a crinkle at the corner that softens the stare. “I am here, Mukuro-sama.”

Hibari rolls his eyes, but allows them their little reunion. He can afford to wait, so he does. He waits as he releases the shears built into his tonfas. They spring open from their polished alloy casings, powerful and sharp, and more than capable of cutting through the rat’s nest of tubing amassed above.

He decides he is done with waiting after another minute of the one-sided, mostly silent conversation and walks briskly away from the tank back towards the exit. Row five, row four, row three.

When Chrome finally seems to notice his distance, Hibari is already some odd vertical tank-lengths away from Mukuro’s own tank. “Hibari-san?” she ventures cautiously, trying to read his expression from afar.

Mukuro on the other hand eyes the heavy-duty industrial cable-cutter blades held loosely by Hibari’s side; the curiously self-satisfied expression on Hibari’s face.

Realisation blooms behind the glass just as Hibari is rocking forward on the balls of his heels and sprinting past Chrome, stepping, vaulting off the raised ledge at the base. Momentum carries him up, past the curved glass; just enough to grab the upper rim and flip on top of Mukuro’s tank.

“Wait, wait Hibari-san!” Chrome cries from below.

“You weren’t speaking. I assumed you were done,” Hibari says as he picks his way through the large bundles of cables and tubes, trying to decide which one was responsible for delivering life support.

He tests his newly installed accessories on a narrow cable no thicker than his wrist. The ends part like butter beneath the blades and Hibari hums in equal parts of satisfaction and disappointment: satisfaction that the shears worked; disappointment when Mukuro doesn’t immediately float to the top of his tank, belly up.

“What do you mean—Mukuro-sama, why are you… Hibari-san, you can’t!”

Oh, but he can. And that’s what sets Hibari above the masses, above the rules, above those who crawl and never learn to fly. What Hibari cannot do is a question apropos of nothing.

Chrome’s protests and diversionary tactics fade into the background hum of generators as Hibari makes quick work of the serpentine mess sprouting from Mukuro’s tank. Too heavy. Too thin. Obviously connected to a light fixture and not at all vital in keeping Rokudo alive. Hibari discards the last two pieces over his shoulder.

Soon all that is left are some of the thickest cables, wider than his entire torso, and the occasional tremors attributable to Ryohei at work. Hibari contemplates his shears, momentarily, then shrugs. Nothing a little bit of effort and a judicious, if not haphazard, application of chained maces couldn’t fix.

(He could always upgrade his tonfas with the pocket laser cutters next time anyway.)

The blades tuck back into their secret compartment neatly. But it’s just as he releases the catches on the chained maces that the prickle he’s come to associate with Mukuro’s aggravating presence flares up like sunburn across the back of his neck.

“You know,” Chrome says from the foot of the tank, a quiet certainty lending her voice the intensity to be heard, “he hadn’t pegged you for someone who leaves things unfinished.”

Hibari stills. The sunburn prickle spreads beneath his collar and the snarl comes to his lips, unbidden.

Below, Chrome is holding a one-sided conversation. “If you’re sure, Mukuro-sama,” she says and takes a deep breath. “You looked best on your hands and knees,” she relates dutifully, hands clasped demurely around the trident’s black and silver etchings, her expression serene, “and that is the memory I shall take with me into the next life.”

She continues without pause:

“All is not lost; the unconquerable Will,

And study of revenge, immortal hate,

And courage never to submit or yield:

And what is else not to be overcome?”

By now the prickle has turned into what felt like a completely unacceptable spider web of bifurcated lines, and Hibari abandons his immediate task at hand to hop back down to ground zero.

On the floor, Chrome has wisely manoeuvred herself outside the immediate strike-range of his tonfas. But Hibari could not care less anyway, especially while trading lengthy, calculative glares of mutual loathing with Mukuro.

This goes on for as long as until Chrome coughs into her fist.

Mukuro jerks his head in an impatient gesture.

“This is only a temporary stay of execution,” Hibari tells him.

Mukuro bubbles back, derisively.

“That’s what you think. Once you’re back to your original state, I will bite you so dead, even your precious Buddhist theories won’t be able to save you.”

Mukuro rolls his one visible eye.

“Are you quite done yet? is what he says,” Chrome translates. She tilts her head to the side, as if listening. “Apparently the Vendicare are regrouping, and Sasagawa-san has run out of fresh topography to mark up.”

“Going to bite you all to death,” Hibari mutters, and quite matter-of-factly shatters the tank with a well-placed kick, brimming with unbridled violence.

“How long has it been since you’ve gotten laid?” is the first thing Mukuro says to him using vocal chords raspy with disuse. “Because that was a very repression-fuelled kick, if I ever saw one.”

Hibari takes a moment to debate the merits of bundling Mukuro in the splintered remains of his tank for the trip back. It’s a good thought, especially when the water-logged illusionist flaunts all forms of rationale and takes his silence as permission to continue.

“Oh, never mind, I get it. Still deluding yourself, I see,” Mukuro mocks. He pitches his voice into an offensively accurate imitation of Hibari’s: “Only herbivores overtly concern themselves with such base needs. What is this mysterious thing called ‘sex,’ anyway?”

“We’re running out of time,” Chrome interrupts before Hibari could take a step towards forcibly ejecting Mukuro from Vendicare via tonfa-propelled means.

“Yes, yes. We mustn’t keep Tsunayoshi waiting. I hear his blood pressure nowadays is abnormally high for his age.”

Being cheated out of his prey not once, but twice in one day does not for a content Hibari make. But Hibari settles, for the time being, with eyeing the two illusionists, one vertically challenged and becoming increasingly water-logged; the other already sopping wet and barely standing on his own even with the help of illusionary muscle mass.

It would be so easy to just kill Mukuro right then and there. So, so easy. But—Hibari shakes his head. He is, if anything, honest with himself at the very least, and he knows himself well. Well enough to understand that there would be no satisfaction there. He would settle matters with Mukuro later, when the other has grown back his fangs.

Hibari stifles a yawn. Until then, he needs a nap.

(And if that’s all a little anti-climatic, well, too bad.)

In the end, the rescue operation is a rousing success despite all the literal and figurative potholes along the way.

Mukuro purses his lips as another explosion dislodges another portion of the ceiling, wall, and floor. “We should hurry before Sasagawa decides to put craters within his crater’s craters.”

“We’ll be okay,” Chrome assures him. “Sasagawa-san knows better now than to beat a dead horse to the ground.”

“By my count, this is round three though, isn’t it?” Mukuro doesn’t look convinced when another aftershock causes more pebbles to tumble down behind them, but decides not to push the issue. “By the way, that last bit with Milton was very inspired. Bravo, my cute little Chrome, bravo.”

“I learn from the best,” she demurs.

Mukuro chuckles. “And you’ve picked up flattery!” he croons. “What else have you learned? Come now, surprise me!”

“Nothing you’re not already aware of, Mukuro-sama.”

They’re hobbling down the tonfa-made corridor at a decidedly slower pace than that of their companion, not quite chasing after the echoes of Hibari’s briskly irate steps.

“I persuaded Ken and Chikusa to leave early,” Chrome is saying as they round a corner. “I think they’re doing some last minute shopping with M.M. for your welcome back party. Is there anything you’d like in particular?”

“A chocolate fountain.”

“Already delivered.”

“An inflatable ball pen.”

“That’s in transit.”

“Hm. Has Tsunayoshi reproduced yet?”

“Mukuro-sama.”

“Then,” Mukuro says, mismatched gaze flickering briefly ahead to where the object of their vaguely insulting conversation continued to pull further away. “Pineapple chicken. Or Peking duck.”

Chrome looks knowingly at her mentor. What might have been reproach tinges her tone. “I don’t think any of the restaurants in the area serve Asian cuisine, Mukuro-sama.”

Snickering indulgently, Mukuro presses his lips to her hair. “Then not to worry,” he says with an airy smile that is all felonious intent and maybe a smidgen of sexual-predator. “I can wait.” Because for all his grandiose ambitions, Mukuro is nothing if not a patient man.

Everything comes together eventually. All in good time.

The albatross circles above mast, riding the warm current that sweeps through his already wind-tousled hair. Even higher up, the sun bears down from a cloudless sky. There’s nothing but blue above, bright and saturated like the waters below, empty but for a white scrap of nautical superstition tracing lazy arcs around his head

It’s almost summer, he notes, and breathes in deeply.

The South China Sea is balmy during this time of year. Salty warm, with the faintest undercurrent of grapefruit, star fruit, dragon fruit, and wickedly reminiscent of dark rooms and aged linen stained with the tears of children.

“Get out of my dream,” Hibari says.

At first there’s nothing but the insistent rocking of the waves. Typical. But then the albatross croons a whimsical sound that’s more of a laugh than the tragic mewl foretold in sea-faring tales. What innocence holding the normalcy of the dream together snaps.

“The first thing I’m going to do when I wake up is break both your legs,” Hibari promises.

The albatross wheels lower. “Only if you actually remember all of this,” comes Mukuro’s voice from, unsurprisingly, the albatross’s beak.

Hibari scoffs. “I’m familiar with your tricks now, herbivore,” he says. “I only agreed to act as your parole officer.” When he finally does look up, it’s to narrow his eyes into threatening grey slits and pin the white bird, now hovering at eye-level, with a look that bespoke of sea-fowls skewered on pointy sticks and marinated in sherry. “If I wanted to, I could consider this a violation of parole.”

Mukuro hums, and the absurdity of an albatross humming is as odd as it sounds. “How does it feel to be as soulless as you are?”

“Souls are fabrications for an even greater fiction,” Hibari replies, bored. “How does it feel to be rendered completely invalid?”

“It’s a wonder Reborn even let you come within Italy’s airspace.”

“He didn’t. Sawada did.”

“I figured as much. And the bed-rest is fine. Five-thousand-count Egyptian cotton hand-woven by virgins from Mount Olympus and my very own bedside chocolate fondue. You’re always welcome to join me, of course.”

It’s an almost droll look that Hibari gives Mukuro’s feathered form. “I take it back. The first thing I’m going to do when I wake up is break your face.”

“You really do say the sweetest things. Did you ever kiss your mother with that mouth of yours?” Mukuro swoops in close enough to brush a wing against Hibari’s face. Close enough to clip Hibari’s nose; quick enough to evade any immediate retaliations had Hibari deigned to react. “Or perhaps you’re simply beside yourself with joy because I’m supposed to transfer to your medical facilities first thing tomorrow so we can bond.”

The boat rocks against a suddenly violent tide and Mukuro assures him, “Don’t worry. I’ll definitely be in shape to attend Tsunayoshi’s wedding next month.”

Hibari twitches reflexively at the idea. “Only if I don’t simply end your miserable existence tomorrow.”

“So you will be visiting?” Mukuro exclaims. “Wonderful. But be careful there, Signor Cloud. One might almost be led to believe you care.”

It’s as laughable an idea as any, and Hibari almost smiles when he reaches out to snap the albatross’s neck. “Keep dreaming,” he says.

He’s fairly certain he can hear that distinctly irritating laughter from somewhere beyond the horizon even after the body sinks beneath the watery surface.

If asked, the Storm Guardian would probably subject the unfortunate-sap-who-didn’t-know-any-better to his painstakingly thorough thesis: wherein like repels like, as is demonstrated by various natural phenomena (refer to footnote 46: magnetism and charged particles, et al), and wouldn’t you say that mist and clouds are quite similar meteorological entities, both comprised of liquid droplets en masse and suspended in air and atmosphere? Totally the same basic make-up, right?

But only the newest recruits assigned to the unenviable job of cleaning up after either Vongola’s Mist or Cloud Guardians ever ask. Would even dare to ask. And they know better than to give voice to an answer, much less offer an educated opinion (the walls have ears; the ceilings have eyes).

Despite Gokudera’s well-worn disgruntlement towards the “lack of minds as brave as they are fucking inquisitive and dumb,” however, the general and unspoken consensus amongst the vast majority of the Vongola Family lies in favour of his conclusion: Rokudo Mukuro and Hibari Kyouya are simply cut from the same bolt of cloth, fashioned after different patterns, and, despite the occasional threat of pre-apocalyptic damage to their shared surroundings, work frightfully well together. They get jobs done, contracts signed, deals made.

So what if there’s always a spot of collateral in the process?

Their assignment is said to have been Reborn’s idea in the first place.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

In the immediate aftermath of the incident, the Vongola finds itself racing to shore up shaken alliances and soothe a great many ruffled feathers. The damage done to Tsuna’s own credentials among the rest of the Families as a result of the Vendicare break-in is not inconsiderable; it takes months of good-will demonstrations by the CEDEF and gratuitous machismo by the Varia to return the Vongola back to its original standing within the community.

It goes without saying that Xanxus had not been happy.

But slowly, one by one, the other Families fall back in line.

It probably helps that one of the conditions the Vongola concedes to, in order to harbour its fugitive Guardian, is to keep him on parole for no less than ten years. The committee appointed to figure out who should get the dubious honour of that responsibility unanimously elected Vongola’s very own Cloud Guardian. Maybe they’d been hoping that the notorious enmity between the infamous Hibari Kyouya and Rokudo Mukuro would solve at least one, if not two, of La Cosa Nostra‘s more immediate problems.

For the record, the conditions of Mukuro’s parole are as follows:

     I.     The Vongola shall, herein and forthwith of this date, August 23, 2018, be held responsible for any and all of Rokudo Mukuro’s actions for the span of ten years.
          A. “Actions” shall be defined to include those performed in both on- and off-the-record activities.

     II.     CEDEF shall be charged with compiling a report on Rokudo Mukuro’s behaviour and mental health once every two years.

     III.    Rokudo Mukuro shall not be allowed to travel outside the Vongola’s main estate unless he is in the company of at least one other capobastone, of whom must be his designated Parole Officer.
          A. The Committee nominates and designates Vongola’s Cloud Guardian, Hibari Kyouya, to the position of Rokudo Mukuro’s Parole Officer.
          B. Whether he likes it or not.

Funny, how things tend to resolve themselves.

Mukuro gets better.

He gets better, and fast, by simply following a self-imposed routine that called for more than the recommended amount of daily exercise.

On Mondays, he directs one of the many nurses whom he has eating out of the palm of his hand to transcribe a handwritten note on perfumed stationary: Dearest duckling pigeon lips Kyouya. On Tuesdays, he chooses a local florist’s number at random and charges the most expensive floral arrangement to the Foundation’s box-weapons R&D account. On Wednesdays, he possesses Fukurou for a little evening flight and teaches Hibird another verse of Kokuyoh’s school anthem. And so on and so forth.

It works out surprisingly well, all things considered.

What should have taken more than a year of physical therapy to accomplish takes him less than three months. In fact, his rate of recovery is so remarkable that the attempts on his life during his tenure as an in-patient at the Foundation’s rehabilitation clinic grew from once a week during the first month to twice a day during the last. Half of the attempts could even be attributed to the Foundation’s leader himself.

“The trick, my dear Chrome,” he says in the aftermath of one such attempt, “is to set up a situation where the only other alternatives to flinging your emaciated body off the bed are either certain death or permanent neurological trauma.”

“That makes sense,” Chrome agrees and feeds him another éclair.

Mukuro stretches on the tattered sheets of his bed, relishing in the visceral pull of non-illusory muscles against tendon and bone. He flicks at the pulpy remains of a half-crushed orange still lodged in his bangs.

Today is a Friday—which meant singing marriage proposal telegrams—and Mukuro’s hospital room looks as it always does after a visit from his unwilling patron. Tonfa-sized crevices in the walls and furniture; the acrid, sharp electric aftertaste of ozone and dying will flames; a colourful wreckage of fruits and other gift basket niceties smeared across the fissured ceiling.

“Boss is getting married on the seventh.”

On the seventh day of the seventh month. Mukuro is willing to bet that the ceremony will be slated for the seventh hour. “Who’s officiating?”

“We’re not sure yet.”

“Who’s invited?”

“The entire Family and close allies.”

“Does that include me?”

“Yes.”

Mukuro barks out a laugh. “Brilliant. The Vongola is being led by an idiot-savant,” he declares mockingly.

Chrome purses her lips in a dubious moue. “I’m not sure if that’s the correct usage of that term.”

“He never learns,” Mukuro drawls, dry as the Sahara, “and yet he’s still stupidly powerful in spite of his crippling idealism. It suffices.” He contemplates the shattered window and the trilling flock of sparrows gingerly picking their way through the wreckage of glass and edibles on the sill. A sly grin spreads across his face. “Well, it can’t be helped. Let’s make sure we choose an appropriate wedding gift, shall we?”

Chrome studies his expression. “What did you have in mind, Mukuro-sama?”

“Oh, nothing too elaborate,” he says, “but it would help if we could borrow the services of our illustrious host’s little yellow companion for an evening.”

So Chrome calls Chikusa, who calls Ken, and together—with a rigorous application of Ken’s lion-channel—they terrorize Hibird long enough for Chrome to nick its tail feathers with Mukuro’s trident.

And when Mukuro’s attending physician finally signs off on his release forms a week later, it’s just in time to attend Vongola Decimo‘s wedding.

Possessing Hibari’s little helper in order to spice up the ceremony has got to be one of the better ideas he’s had this decade, Mukuro decides, awareness snapping back into his own body just as the bride and groom exchange rings and the entire fifth row from the giddy couple bursts into a shower of splintered bits. With Hibird safely back on its organ-pipe perch and unaware of just how it was made to sexually harass its master’s ear, Mukuro smiles winningly at the vision of rage descending on his own row of pews. Not only did he deliver a truly obnoxious rendition of Kokuyoh’s anthem, he also managed to blow in Hibari’s ear. The fact that the petite but venerable “Father Bornicus” had made no move to stop him is like an unlooked-for benediction.

“Congratulations, Tsunayoshi!” Mukuro calls out brightly, manically, as he ducks half an uprooted bench and dances around the stunned body of what looks to be one of Gokudera’s crew.

Hibari is almost on top of him now, having advanced over church property and wedding guests alike, teeth bared and tonfas brandished.

“Cazzo. Stand down everybody, especially you Hibari, stand down—goddammit, show the Tenth some fucking respect you fucking psychopaths!” Gokudera swears from where he has taken cover and is lighting up fuses by the dozen. Soon Mukuro is dodging not only tonfa-swings aimed at his sternum, but also miniature explosions that dog his every step.

“You may now kiss the bride,” Father Bornicus says and Ryohei bursts into tears.

Life, Mukuro concludes, is finally looking up.

Then, a mere two months after the wedding, Sasagawa Kyouko announces her first pregnancy.

But that is another story altogether.

The consequences of retrieving Mukuro from Vendicare don’t go to hell in a hand basket for a long time. A long enough time for Tsuna to almost convince himself that as long as Mukuro stayed out of Hibari’s way, maybe, just maybe, everything could work out. It’s an utterly hopeless belief, but nobody, least of all Tsuna’s associates and confidantes, can fault him for wanting to delay the inevitable as long as possible.

The Vongola estate in Italy is a sprawling piece of prime real estate—lovely in the spring, quaint in the fall, and most importantly, capable of guaranteeing that nobody had to cross paths if he or she so wished. During the first few months following Mukuro’s full recovery, the illusionist had submitted to the terms of his house arrest almost affably and without complaint. Meanwhile, Mukuro’s designated parole officer continued to drift between landmasses and single-person assignments, as he was wont, and all was good.

Too bad all good things must come to an end.

It comes soon enough—too soon—a mission that requires cooperation from Mukuro’s former contacts on top of Mukuro’s own particular skill sets.

“This is such a bad idea,” Tsuna says. The dust is still settling.

Reborn fixes a bland and wholly reproving look at his former student. “Oh? Did you have a better one?” he asks, as mild as a spring breeze. Of course, what he actually meant was “Is that an invitation to shoot you?”

Tsuna doesn’t answer. As a matter of fact, he would very much like to challenge his mentor’s counsel, as is his bloody right as the head of the Family, but perhaps another time. Kyouko’s expecting him home for dinner tonight after all.

He buries his face in both hands instead, and doesn’t breathe.

When Gokudera came in that morning with news that negotiations between the Vongola’s United States branch and a rival Family had gone horribly pear-shaped, all Tsuna had to do was close his eyes to see the post-apocalyptic ruin that was his relationship with half of North America’s underground network. Mukuro and Hibari’s first mission together promised to be an absolute blood-fest even on paper—but needs must, and all that, when the devil drives.

Debriefing his two most capricious Guardians at the same time and on the same matter was… not good.

Mukuro’s parting words had been nothing short of wicked, triumphant, and darkly amused; Hibari’s expression before he too left—a tight-lipped, wide-eyed, burning stare directed primarily at Reborn—had been a novelty in and of itself. As if its owner was not used to wearing it.

Betrayal. It didn’t take the Vongola’s Hyper Tuition to figure that one out.

Tsuna thinks he can still hear the sounds of his Cloud Guardian razing both furniture and hapless passers-by’s alike in his wake. What remains of his office door (quite a bit, surprisingly) swings three-and-a-half more times on splintered hinges before toppling backwards in an impressive spray of woodchips and debris.

“This is such a bad idea.”

“They’ll get used to it,” Reborn says.

Reborn is wrong.

They leave for New York on a cold December morning, at the same time, on the same flight, for all their departure is a fiasco that renders their intended jet without an engine. It’s a miracle their back-up flight manages to take off at all.

Both come back two weeks later on an equally chilly January evening, looking whole and hale for the most part. That too is a miracle.

Mukuro delivers his report through Chrome hours before their vehicle even touches ground, but it’s Hibari who’s in actual possession of the renegotiated terms and papers.

Hibari enters and leaves Tsuna’s office in the same instant he all but throws the loose-leaf report stack at Tsuna’s head. Probably to go wipe out a small country’s worth of people he found spuriously offensive, or whatever it is he does to relieve that tangible rage of his. Tsuna knows better than to call back the older man for an actual debriefing. He’s just glad he had the forethought to give Gokudera the night off.

“It could have been worse, Boss,” Chrome says encouragingly before making her own exit.

Tsuna doesn’t disagree.

Even if he could, he wouldn’t. Because his Cloud and Mist Guardians’ first mission together is an absolute success on paper and Tsuna can only imagine what isn’t written on the deceptively clean pages.

For what it’s worth, Tsuna’s predictions (also interchangeable with “fears”) were right: the first mission was a bloodbath; the second, third, and fourth missions—Zurich, Istanbul, and Hong Kong, respectively—aren’t much better; and the fifth operation (New York, again) is almost as memorable as the first.

(Word on the street suggests that the lesser gangs along the east coast states are still in disarray. Like the little rats they are.)

The missions are really only successes in the most general sense because when something like Hibari Kyouya is made to suffer prolonged exposure to something like Rokudo Mukuro…

Well. All it takes is an ill-timed quip and for nature to take hold of the reins, so to speak.

He blames Mukuro. Hibari blames Mukuro for almost everything nowadays. The rest he blames on Tsuna and, by proxy, Reborn.

As far as Hibari is concerned, the only redeeming factor in the entire ludicrous arrangement is that he gets an almost unlimited bevy of opportunities to bite the irritation incarnate to death. That Mukuro is also apparently a direct descendant of cockroaches capable of surviving nuclear strikes deters him not at all.

(He almost succeeds too, once, in Cannes, in a public restroom, with a twenty-paged dossier plus paperclip.)

But even a work dynamic such as theirs, no matter how unwanted, cannot remain static.

It’s just not until the eleventh assignment that there is any change worth note.

They’re in Argentina in order to take out a problem—an ex-informant with some skill in illusions who defected to the Chechen mafia type of problem—when things begin to change. Whether for better or for worse is only a matter of perspective.

“Come out, come out wherever you are,” Mukuro calls out in a voice made to receive restraining orders. The acoustics of the abandoned packaging plant magnify the sheer harassment value by ten.

Hibari responds with an especially scathing look he usually reserves for the terminally ill and brain-damaged. It’s a look he’s only used twice in his life before meeting Rokudo Mukuro.

(The first time was when he’d caught a brainless vermin tracking mud all over Namimori Middle School’s newly renovated hallways; the second time was when he found Bucking Horse’s pet turtle two sizes too big, smelling suspiciously like freshly roasted Columbian and trying to mount Hibird atop a makeshift Namimori Handbook love nest; both times had ended with lots of blood and private property damage.)

When Mukuro opens his mouth again, no doubt to follow up his first offence with a second, Hibari takes a controlled swing at his head. Mukuro ducks by a hair. The metal support beam behind him isn’t so lucky.

“Quiet,” Hibari snaps not so quietly himself and hisses when the desperate rhythm of their quarry’s footsteps disappears a moment later.

“Aw, did we lose him? Tsk, Kyouya, tsk.”

Hibari rounds on the mocking Italian. “Since you’re obviously incapable of remaining silent on your own,” he begins, sotte voce deceptively loud, only to still abruptly at the muffled sound of multiple guns cocking.

They both duck behind a row of shipping crates a split-second before the bullets rip through the air ahead.

“My, would you look at that,” Mukuro says. “An ambush.”

A few stray bullets ricochet harmlessly off the various metal surfaces of chutes and conveyor belts.

“Neophytes,” Hibari says. His nose wrinkles in distaste.

“But there are so many of them.”

The rain of bullets continues above their crouched positions as frantic voices get louder. Twenty. Thirty-five. Sixty.

“¡Allí, allí! ¡Esos trolos del Vongola se esconden allí!“

Hibari rounds up. Seventy-five. A herd of seventy-five herbivores. Plus one if he counts the traitorous vermin in their midst. He turns to see Mukuro doubled over and clutching his stomach in what appears to be mirth and not excruciating pain from a well-placed bullet. Another reason to despise amateurs

“What are you laughing about?” Hibari demands.

“If only, if only,” Mukuro gasps through his chortles. “Ah. How is your Spanish?”

“It’s fine.”

“Then is this your first time in Argentina? It must be.”

Hibari favours Mukuro with another look—this time it’s one that questions the quality of Italy’s public schooling.

“Oh, don’t worry. I’m sure it wasn’t anything against you personally. Besides, it’s better if you didn’t know. Trust me.”

“Trust you,” Hibari echoes flatly.

Mukuro peers around the corner. “Seventy or so, wouldn’t you say? Off you go.” He makes a shooing motion with one hand. “Go on. Go bite them all dead.”

Hibari tamps down on the ever-present urge to tear off Mukuro’s arms and wade into the fight with those in place of his tonfas.

“Any specific requests for today before you go frolicking in guts and glory?” Mukuro asks, discoloured eye flickering from six to one. Even as he waves, the air begins to distort in that familiar and hateful manner Hibari associates with all illusions. “How about the Bahamas? The steppes? Or perhaps you would prefer a jungle?”

But Hibari doesn’t hear him, having already entered the fray.

“Tarzan it is.”

Alarmed shouts turn into screams that blend in with the gratuitous shrieks of Howler monkeys and birds of paradise as Japan’s most lethal export systematically mows down everything that moves. A ring of throats here, a parade of broken tibias there. Teeth fly and blood splatters as Hibari doles out his brand of discipline upon the unruly masses.

The sheer mindless violence is as therapeutic as it always is.

Until he gets shot.

Sniper, Hibari thinks to himself following the gut-punch sensation low in his abdomen. He looks down and frowns some more as his suit jacket turns a shade darker and wetter than charcoal black. He only takes a moment to consider his options—he can work through pain, easy, but the rate of blood loss might prove to be problematic. An inconvenience borne of carelessness. Moving quickly, he dispatches the last of the Chechen men, permanently crippling two and killing the third. He then scans the rafters disguised as a green canopy, mouth set tight against the sticky warmth spreading along his side. He drops to his knees, an inkblot target on the wild green tangle of forest undergrowth, just as another shot whistles uncomfortably close to his ear.

And just as suddenly, the entire illusion melts away altogether.

Hibari tries to focus on breathing and not pitch face-first onto the bloodied tarmac. When a minute passes without anybody else shooting at him, Hibari amends his immediate goal to that of just breathing.

“Well, well, isn’t this a familiar sight?” Polished shoes step gingerly around the teeth and bloodied bits scattered around Hibari. They come to stop at the edge of his vision. “All we’re missing now are a few bushels of cherry blossoms.”

Somehow Hibari still finds it in himself to snarl at Mukuro who drops into a crouch in front of him, gloved hands clasped loosely around the staff of his trident.

“I’ve taken care of the few stragglers you missed, including the target and his guardian angel–you’re welcome by the way.”

“How?” Hibari bites out.

“Illusions can be fickle things,” Mukuro says, sounding unforgivably smug. “Turns out our dearly departed Judas is, or rather was, more skilled in theoretical illusions than our intel previously suggested.” At Hibari’s uncomprehending glare, he sighs and elaborates, “Mr. Abramov took advantage of my larger illusion and layered his own piss-poor attempt beneath it to mask the sniper. Needless to say, his theory was sound, and despite his being an illusionist only capable of creating second-rate illusions, it worked.”

Hibari feels himself begin to list to the side, only half-listening to Mukuro’s pontifications. He closes his eyes, gunshot wound be damned. Rarely does he suffer the fleeting thought of finding someplace to lick his wounds, but now he has needs. He needs to regroup. Recover. He needs.

“Oh,” he says.

How the hell he’s still upright is a mystery.

“Oh, indeed. I think you’re going to need to be brought up to speed on illusions if we’re going to continue this thing of ours.” A leather-clad finger reaches out to rest against Hibari’s cheek, smearing a spot of blood most likely not Hibari’s own as if to emphasize a point. “So. Is it the hydrostatic shock or is it the blood loss? It’s been almost ten minutes since you’ve been shot and it looks like you’re only now beginning to go into shock,” the owner of the finger remarks. “Unfortunately, I don’t have any first aid on me—not that it would have been of any use on you. You’re a mess.” Mukuro tuts.

Oh, really, Hibari thinks acidly. He tries to open his eyes again and barely manages even that; the visceral need to reach out and damage that sticky-sweet tone was the only thing keeping oblivion at bay. He doesn’t even realise he’s spoken out loud until the voice replies, “You can try later when you’re no longer bleeding out on a floor in South America.”

Hibari finds it in himself to cough a bloodied “Fuck You” all over Mukuro’s leg.

“Promises, promises. Now, be quiet while I Google first aid techniques.”

And then, darkness.

But not before he gets Mukuro’s other leg for good measure.

How they ultimately get out without the local authorities baying at their heels isn’t nearly as exciting as what happens during the after-aftermath of the Abramov mission.

Apropos of nothing, Mukuro chooses to write the report in verse. Like a sonnet, complete with the necessary meters and syllabic stresses. ‘Twas but a flesh wound that doth suffered the lark, the text reads with a sincerity that’s as believable as Mukuro’s understanding of sixteenth century poetry and common sense.

It’s a masterpiece if he does say so himself.

That Gokudera almost stubs his cigarette through the entire hundred-paged stack only reaffirms that fact.

But Hibari gets better. Mukuro’s erstwhile rival-turned-partner gets better in spite of the degree of shock and critical amounts of blood loss sustained. Everyone suspects Mukuro’s involvement one way or another, direct or indirect.

(They’re not wrong to suspect either; only fools would think otherwise.)

It’s as if Hibari bullied his cells and tissues into submission; as if he bent his own body to his will. The amount of time Hibari takes to heal, the sheer brevity of it, is ludicrous. But, frankly Mukuro would be more surprised if that were not the case.

He’s equally unsurprised that the first thing Hibari does upon his return to active duty is to try to bite him dead. Emphasis on the “try.”

(By the time Hibari finishes venting and Mukuro stops running, all that is left of the Foundation’s private clinic is a supply closet and one-and-a-half centrifuge machine. Faced with what has to be a budgetary nightmare, Kusakabe only sighs. The facilities were due for renovations anyway.)

For all practical purposes, the enmity between them remains as strong as ever. Subsequent missions are still carried out with almost gratuitous amounts of violence and bloodshed. Hibari still addresses Mukuro as if he was pond scum marring the soles of his expensive leather shoes, and Mukuro still replies as one would to a favoured cocker spaniel. Or a prized goldfish.

To the casual observer, nothing has changed. But to those familiar enough with their customary interactions since times immemorial (or at least, times pubescence), there is something new lurking beneath the surface, something more than just inherent animosity. Something like the thinnest veneer of civility between Tsuna’s two most vicious Guardians.

Whatever it is, it’s wholly alien to those who are otherwise used to seeing the paint peel whenever Hibari and Mukuro enter each other’s fifty cubic meters of air space. If they haven’t already run for the hills, soon even the most trepid will want answers.

Mukuro doesn’t want to make it easy for his reluctantly curious co-workers though, and so he takes somewhat perverse pleasure in making himself scarce after turning in his report.

Case in point: an entire week passes before Gokudera finally manages to track him down long enough in the backyard atrium.

“We need to talk,” Gokudera says.

“And to what do I owe this pleasure?” Mukuro slips a scrap of paper, what might have once been a sales receipt, between the pages of his book and waits expectantly.

“Now.”

Mukuro glances at his watch, thinking fast. “Bottiglia Lounge is open,” he says, just to see Vongola’s right hand man splutter.

“What? What’s wrong with here you—no! Absolutely not.”

“Then that’s too bad, really. It’s either a night out on the town, or a night trying to chase me down again. Your pick.”

“And violate your parole? What kind of idiot do you think I—” Gokudera bites his tongue when all of a sudden he’s looking at the good-natured, weathered face of his own second-in-command, Giulio.

“Surprise,” Mukuro says in Giulio’s gravel-rough voice and crosses his legs in a very un-Giulio-like manner.

“You’ve done this before,” Gokudera says flatly. Unwanted realisation pinches his expression a shade closer to one of constipation.

“Whatever helps you sleep at night,” Mukuro all but sings his taunt, knowing very well that Giulio is by far one of the most tone-deaf members on the Vongola’s payroll. When Gokudera fails to offer any other objections, he uncrosses his legs. “That settles it then,” he says, getting up and dusting off his slacks. He saunters towards the exit. “Shall we?”

It’s early enough that the establishment is not crowded. Far from deserted, but populated enough to provide an almost pleasant backdrop of garbled conversation and noise. The starkly black and white décor provides for a monochromatic affair, offset by the pointed addition of jewel toned lamps and liquors on display. The Bottiglia Lounge Bar specializes in fruity mixed drinks, sleekly contemporaneous furnishings, and an environment entirely conducive to conversations of the more confidential sort.

Gokudera has never been to Bottiglia before and he’s not sure if this excursion will make him ever want to come back again.

“You’re buying?” is the first thing Mukuro says upon making a bee-line for the bar. “Excellent. A La Rossa for me,” he says to the bar tender, “and something girly with an umbrella and sugar on the rim for my surly friend here. Grazie.”

“Is all of this necessary?” Gokudera demands when they take their drinks to a secluded corner booth. He eyes his violently fluorescent cocktail with distrust.

“No, but it irritates you,” Mukuro smiles winningly and Gokudera feels sick. The face is all wrong, expression too sly for Giulio’s warmly weathered features. “You should take your men out more. I’m sure they’d appreciate it.”

“Have you been violating your parole using my subordinates all this time?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Mukuro scoffs. “Whatever gave you the idea that I’d be favouring your subordinates when there are others who are much better looking?”

He’s clearly being baited. Clearly.

Gokudera watches Mukuro closely. The Tenth would be proud with how well he’s controlling his urge to shove a bomb or ten down the manipulative bastard’s throat.

“What are you up to, Mukuro?”

“What am I not?” Mukuro finishes his beverage with a little murmur of appreciation. “But if you really must know, I’m teaching my dearest duckling lips the finer points of illusions.”

“Duckling lips.”

“Yes.”

“Dearest duckling lips. Your dearest duckling lips.”

“Did I stutter?”

Gokudera rakes a hand through his hair, screws his eyes shut, pinches the bridge of his nose, and not necessarily in that order. “Fine. You’re now giving Hibari lessons on illusions. Why?”

“Why not?” Mukuro shrugs, turns in his seat and flags down a server with his empty bottle. “Another, if you will.”

“And he lets you?”

Mukuro smiles. “Not happily.”

Gokudera’s mind is shifting gears into overdrive, picking up multiple hypotheses and discarding them in as systematic a manner as possible. Abramov, illusion theories, and gunshot wounds. Illusions within illusions, he must go deeper, and why does that sound so familiar. Mukuro’s reports always tend to tread the fine line of professionalism badly, and extracting details from the prose is like pulling teeth from a particularly reticent shark. Or Squalo.

One idea is so ludicrous that he almost dismisses it out of hand immediately: what if Mukuro is trying to avoid a repeat of Argentina?

What if, what if. The idea snags.

“Are you,” Gokudera begins. Stops. Begins again. “Are you trying to protect him? Hibari?” He immediately regrets his question because when Mukuro starts to laugh, he doesn’t stop.

The peals of mirth border on cackles, each word punctuated by a nest of hysteria. “Protect. You thought, you thought that I. To protect him! Him.” And just as quickly as he had dissolved into laughter, Mukuro sobers up again. “Well, you’re not entirely wrong.”

The swing from manic to bemused jars Gokudera out of his shock-induced immobility. “Are you unhinged?” he hisses just as the server returns.

Mukuro accepts his beer and leans back in his seat. “Who knows? But I feel obligated to point out that that’s not the diagnosis my psychiatrist gave me.”

“The psychiatrist we assigned you to do your evals is now institutionalized and stuck on step two in a seven step rehabilitation program.”

“Mm. Whoever arranged the assignments must not have liked her very much.”

Gokudera glowers because it was true. And may have been true even before she mysteriously went stark-raving mad and confessed to being a spy.

“Okay then,” he tries again, “explain to me at least how I’m not entirely wrong.”

“What’s there to explain? I’m just making sure that a particular personal interest doesn’t get himself killed like a gormless idiot the next time we’re out. How else am I supposed to keep myself amused while I wait for other investments to mature?” Mukuro speaks patronizingly slow, a contraband sort of amusement oh-so-very clear in his half-lidded gaze, and Gokudera should be offended, but he’s not because he now finally understands even though he kind of really, really wishes he doesn’t.

“Why are you revealing all this now?” Gokudera asks even as he mentally makes for arrangements to file a restraining order against Mukuro on behalf of the Eleventh. He’ll even petition Interpol if necessary.

“What makes you think I’ve revealed anything to you?”

He has a point. Mukuro Rokudo’s penchant for body-snatching is far from mysterious; it’s a shameless, celebrated hobby.

“All I’ve told you thus far is that contrary to what might be popular belief, I might not be in any hurry to rid myself of my keeper for purely selfish reasons.”

“You mean you like the fact that he’s now spending most of his time with you, if not to immediately smear you into the ground, then to learn how to better smear you into the ground in the near future?”

“You know how he fixates on things,” Mukuro hums. “With this much attention, doesn’t it almost seem as if I’m being courted? You should try it. It’s actually quite flattering.”

The illusion of Giulio flickers for the briefest moment and Gokudera stares, just stares at Mukuro’s own self-satisfied smirk (an expression he’s only now beginning to realise is especially tailored to simply piss off certain recipients with certain temperaments).

“You. You are an unbelievably sick and fucking twisted bastard.” He makes it a statement and blindly grabs at the stem of his cocktail glass, downing the entirety of the syrupy sweet drink in one go and grimacing when he’s done. “That drink was disgusting, by the way.”

“Oh, that. That may or may not be because of all the ipecac I slipped you. I’m surprised you didn’t notice earlier.”

Gokudera can’t even find it in himself to be surprised. “Sick. And fucking twisted.”

Mukuro smiles beatifically. “So they say. But personally, I prefer ‘inspired.’”

“If it makes you feel better,” Gokudera says. “Now, I’m going to go to the men’s room and you’re going to come with me and hold my hair back while I puke out whatever it is you gave me.”

“And then?”

“Then we’re going to go back and you can fuck off and continue doing whatever ‘inspired’ thing it is you do after you poison your coworkers. If you manage to drive us back without getting us pulled over, I’ll even hold off on telling Hibari of your spectacularly disturbing plans to create monster children with him.”

“Oh, goody,” Mukuro says.

It takes them twenty minutes to leave Bottiglia, half of which Gokudera spends draped over a porcelain throne. But somehow, through some miracle or divine provenance, they make it back to the Vongola estate alive and mostly undetected.

Gokudera remains true to his word. No matter how much it pains his conscience, he doesn’t inform the Tenth of their little excursion, and he sure as hell does not seek out Hibari. All he does is update his own personal intel: Mukuro Rokudo may carry syrup of ipecac on his person at all times.

The unfortunate thing about inspiration though, is that it can be contagious—which is why Gokudera volunteers Yamamoto the next time Reborn produces another high profile mission involving both Mukuro and Hibari and some secret base drama in Siberia.

When Yamamoto reacts to his assignment with an unsuspecting smile, Gokudera can’t help but feel a sick thrum of anticipation.

The Tenth deserves to know just what viper’s nest of plotting his Mist Guardian is up to, and because misery loves company, Gokudera sure as hell isn’t going to suffer the burden alone.

Gokudera’s plan works a little too well.

The day Yamamoto returns together with Mukuro and Hibari is the day Tsuna’s world gets just that much more comfortable with being the butt of some grand cosmic joke.

“Man, Tsuna, way to make a guy feel completely useless,” Yamamoto says as he steps into Tsuna’s office. He laughs as a way of greeting; his cheer is infectious, bright and loud, but he closes the door behind him oh-so-quietly.

Tsuna clasps his hands together where he can see them; on top of his desks and poised in stillness. He masks the querulous thrill of anxiety he feels with a warm smile of his own. He doesn’t dare hope. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Yamamoto unslings his sword as he crosses the room and sinks into one of the two matching armchairs facing the gilded executive desk. Long-legged and loose-limbed, Vongola’s sword expert makes controlled sprawling look like an art form.

Which, Tsuna muses absently, is probably part of the reason why all those unmarried daughters keep on throwing themselves at his Rain Guardian during those inter-Family meet-and-greet socials. He watches Yamamoto stretch and visibly relax into the plush cushions of the chair.

Yamamoto catches him looking and regards him with a good-natured grin. “Was a little worried you were mad at me or something actually,” he says.

“Why would you think that?” Tsuna laughs.

“Well, I don’t how much trouble you were expecting out of this gig, but what’s that one saying? That one with the two’s and the three’s,” Yamamoto says. He scratches thoughtfully at the nape of his neck, searching for the answer and snaps his fingers when he finds it. “Ah! ‘Two’s company, three’s a crowd.’“

“‘Three’s a crowd?’“ Tsuna feels his smile falter. An oddly heightened sense of discomfort settles in the pits of his stomach.

“Yup. All I did really was help out the clean-up crew,” Yamamoto says, “Not to say that that was super easy or anything. I mean, it got pretty bloody with Hibari going on a warpath. Can’t really blame him though, what with Mukuro pretty much leading him on like that.”

“Wait. Wait, wait, wait. Leading him on like what?”

Yamamoto purses his lips in thought. “Like he—it was really weird actually. Like, you know how you used to get the person you like to notice you?”

“Yes. You mean how I stripped to my boxers to do all sorts of unmentionable things in front of Kyouko with my dying will? It’s kind of hard to forget.”

“Haha, okay not you, but say others. Little boys pulling little girls’ pigtails on the school playground. That sorta thing. It was kind of like that.”

“Oh my god.”

“Haha, I know right?” Yamamoto scratches his head sheepishly. “I was totally benched from the first inning to the last.”

That explains the abnormally high body count, Tsuna thinks faintly. And the cleaning bill. And the really creepy “do you know what your Guardians are doing” anonymous voicemail he received last night.

It is altogether too easy to imagine what might constitute as “pig-tail pulling” in Mukuro’s book.

Yamamoto fidgets in the ensuing silence. “Hey, Tsuna?” he hedges when Tsuna continues to stare into space with a vague impression of awestruck horror on his face. “it is totally cool between us right? You sure you’re not mad at me or anything? One hundred percent positive?”

It should now go without saying that the mafia is, at times, nothing more than a group of gossips armed to the teeth. But in the case of Hibari and Mukuro, it’s not so much as gossip as it is epic retellings of What They Did Last Thursday, Part IV. Like a series of poetic eddas, but with less emphasis on heroic deeds and more on the razing and pillaging.

Apparently even the members of Varia are impressed. Not that they actually say so, nor in so many words.

(Squalo’s messages run more along the lines of “Call your fucking psychos to heel already, goddammit, and tell them to stop stealing our kills,” punctuated by lots of yelling and what might have been Xanxus’s second, third, fourth, fifth favourite whiskey glass meeting its untimely demise in the background.)

Word has it that Yamamoto dubbed them “The Amazing Tag Team” awhile back in the wreckages of their first mission together after the Argentina incident. Then Ryohei improved it to “The Extremely Amazing Tag Team” in his glowing review as their extremely unnecessary back-up. Nowadays however, most people use Lambo’s latest contribution, “The Tag Team You’d Most Like to Never Meet In a Dark Alley,” affectionately abbreviated to “The Serial Killer Team,” ranked second-most effective combination and only behind the completely hypothetical Byakuran-Mukuro tag team last time Fuuta checked.

Somewhere, somehow, and in between the births of one Sawada Ienobu and another Sawada Ietsugu, Vongola’s strongest and most dysfunctional combination becomes a rare creature of sheer, dumb fortune.

They should not work together as well as they do, and they sure as hell don’t ninety-nine percent of the time outside of missions for the Family.

They bicker over what is the most efficient way to dispose of a body. Of ten bodies. Of a hundred. They dominate the record books by entering more mutual sabotage attempts in a given month than there are in the average divorce proceedings. Once, they even disagree over which box weapons are best implemented during which assignments. (Hibari insists on a lemming infestation for operations involving multi-storied buildings; Mukuro opines that perhaps a kraken would be better instead; Hibari says something to the effects of "your opinion is worthless--go fondle a palm tree, you waste of air and space"; Mukuro releases his kraken anyway).

Despite all odds, they fall into a questionable sort of co-existence, because calling it a partnership isn’t entirely accurate and calling it a relationship is more of death wish than anything else.

They become disturbingly domestic in a way. And Hibari almost kills the first new recruit stupid enough to voice that opinion in his presence.

This is the inevitable conclusion and it goes something like this:

Most lessons Tsuna has fallen into, headfirst, and drowned in. Some lessons he has beaten into him with the tender loving care only a mafia hitman stuck in a pre-prepubescent body could invoke.

There is one lesson, however, that Tsuna learns by sheer virtue of being unable to avoid like any other self-preserving person. Hazards of circumstance and all that.

Had Tsuna been ten years younger, he would have definitely shrieked the unmanliest of all unmanly shrieks to ever bring down shame upon the collective head of the Vongola. Shame, and a handwritten pass inviting Xanxus to shoot his face at point blank range.

Instead he latches a death grip to the maturity and dignity born of a decade as a leader of men and settles with averting his eyes from the sight of his two most wayward guardians biting at each other's faces, oh god.

All he had wanted was to grab some negotiation papers from his office. His office. But he can’t, because Reborn is a liar. Reborn is a lying liar who lies, and the first-hand knowledge of this truth does nothing to mitigate the fact that Tsuna might go blind before he hits thirty.

A chunk of insulation and a belt buckle fly across his field of vision despite all his best efforts to cling to blessed ignorance with his dying will.

"This is so surprising," Reborn remarks. “Didn't see this one coming at all." He doesn't even bat an eyelash.

Tsuna swivels his look of disbelief from the nightmarish display of blood and utterly ruined interior decor and what he really hopes isn't some other-world-esque form of foreplay, to the gods-be-damned unruffled man beside him.

“Why, Tsunayoshi, I never pegged you for one to indulge in voyeuristic tendencies. Don’t worry we’ll put your bookshelf back together when we’re done.”

Papers be damned. Tsuna cannot flee fast enough.

This is the true ending:

Years later, Hibari finally perfects the box-weapon technology to fit humans. He becomes the first and only successful experimental subject. Mukuro continues to cheat death the old-fashioned way.

But that too is another story altogether.

(And they grew old together and in due time kill each other, happily ever after.)

FIN
Completed: September 30, 2012