Daemon’s Fate #6
[Katekyo Hitman Reborn]
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Summary: When Tsuna wasn’t born with a daemon, it drew attention. He was bullied so much that Nana was forced to take drastic measures. Yet, after Tsuna saves two animals (an abandoned baby phoenix, and a starved lion cub) they start following him around and people (including Reborn and the mafia) start making new assumptions… Poor them. Drabbles and some chapters.
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Part 6: What’s Wrong with Being Confident?
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Throwing himself on his bed in his room, Tsuna covered his eyes with his right arm. He doesn't really want to see anything right now. Everything that happened downstairs had done nothing but set him off. He hated that name. Hated it so much. It reminded him of so many things, of blood, of bullying and crying. The word alone was enough to make him want to hide to lock himself in his room. But even as he thinks that he knows that's not something he should fall back into. He's someone different now.
He's not Dame-Tsuna anymore, he has familiars. Two of them now, so he isn't lonely anymore. He's different. Older, better than he used to be. He isn't weak. That was his past. He was just Tsuna now. Not Dame-Tsuna.
Yet still, just the thought of the word was enough to make him want to punch something.
The word, that horrible nickname was, coming back to haunt him, in the one place he thought he was safe. He thought he had buried that past, and moved on from it, but Reborn still keeps bringing it up and throwing it at him and he hates him for it. Reborn was everything he never wanted in his life. Reborn was chaos, a connection to his father, and bloodshed. Reborn was darkness playing at civility and he thought he could just walk into the house and destroy any semblance of Tsuna's life and its okay.
It's not okay.
This whole mess is not going to go away.
When Tsuna told Reborn he wasn't going to be a mafia boss, he meant it. Tsuna doesn't care what some far-flung old man wants, or even what his father wants. This is his life, and no one else gets to have a say in it. He's done doing that. He has the scars to prove it.
Wiping the tears from his eyes, Tsuna pushes himself up from his bed and leans against his bedroom wall. He would not cry more over this. Crying was worthless. He just needed the calm to return. Taking a deep breath, he started going through his breathing exercises. He started counting backward from a hundred in Japanese and when that wasn't enough, through Italian, and French and then through any other languages he knew. He was a little unsteady, and it took longer then he would have like to calm himself but eventually, his emotions settled.
Tsubird was nuzzling him, cooing softly through his hair while he worked himself out of his breakdown and Natsu rubbed his mane on his arm as he purred. Their strength helping him come back to the present, instead of staying in the past. Patting them both on the head, he smiled softly.
He was okay.
Everything was okay.
He just had a bad dinner.
And that's okay.
Tomorrow is a new day.
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Downstairs, Dino and Romario didn't have that same feeling as Nana started to chew out Reborn.
"I don't think you should treat Tsu-kun like that." She says but there's no warmth in her eyes and her fingers are rather tight around her chopsticks. "After all you are a guest, and guests should be polite." She tells him coldness setting in her eyes. It had taken everyone in the room completely off guard, that the sweet mild-manner housewife of only minutes before is now staring down Reborn, the greatest hitman in the world and lecturing him.
Reborn is staring at her, somewhat in surprise. He didn't think Nana could even get angry, and yet she is. Iemitsu noted that his wife was sweet and he had never seen her angry, and yet in the back of his mind, he just assumed she couldn't be angry. Perhaps he should have had his argument with Tsuna in his room after dinner, or done something else. But still, he figures he might as well as say something. The last thing he needed for Nana to get in the way of his tutoring. It would make his job substantially harder if Nana completely evicted him from the house.
What a mess.
"And a polite guest should apologize." She says turning sharply in Reborn's direction. If she seems more dangerous than she did five minutes ago, well Dino thinks its a trick of the light, even as she stabs hard enough through her meat and plate. It has to be. And yet, the room seems colder, darker, and it's causing him to shake. Nana must have left the AC on or something. Even poor Enzo on his shoulder is starting to get cold. Patting his daemon, he barely looks up in time to see Nana stand and glower down at Reborn.
"So I suggest you go and do that," Nana says walking away with her broken plate and a flash of a red liquid as she went past him. He was probably seeing things. Maybe Nana liked her meat a little rare or something. Nana was a civilian, after all, there was little she could do that was threatening, after all, so she was safe, and...
He swallowed weakly.
Why couldn't he get his hands to stop shaking?
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Contrary to what Nana wanted Reborn did not apologize to Tsuna.
In fact, unlike Reborn's normal routine, he wasn't in the Sawada Residence that night. Nor at breakfast.
Dino noticed this after he retreated to bed, but it was more evident at the breakfast table, where instead of Tsuna putting out the dishes, Nana did so with a loud clatter. Her smile was still cold and although she made note of Reborn absence from the residence, that didn't stop her from trying to interrogate Dino at the breakfast table. Tsuna was no help to him, simply picking up his own breakfast plate from his mother and retreating to his room.
The only back-up Dino had was his right-hand man who was sitting behind him, but even that wasn't enough to stop his hands from shaking again.
Dino knew Nana was a civilian, but something about her was causing every single one of his senses to tell him to run. Something about her was dangerous even though he knew better and it was creeping him the hell out. If he could get his legs to stop shaking he might have excused himself, but something about the look in her eyes freezes him in place.
He ignored the voice in the back of his mind that says it because he's afraid of turning his back to her.
Instead, he simply goes through breakfast trying to eat as quickly as possible and answer as truthfully as he could.
Don't lie, the voice tells him. Or she'll know.
Shallowing his food, Dino goes over what he knows about the Sawada Residence, trying fruitlessly to remember if Nana's profile had sent up any flags when he completed the background check, but even he combs through what he knows, nothing about her past remotely sound dangerous. Her last job before she had been married had been a secretary for god sake. Why was he so scared?
And why is the room still so cold?
He shouldn't be cold, he's wearing his jacket.
And he's got to get out of here—
"Please stop Kaa-san," Another voice says cutting through Dino's fear. "Dino-nii isn't responsible for Reborn," Tsuna tells her appearing from behind him. Dino hadn't even noticed his younger brother was back in the room. How had he managed that? Had he really been that distracted by Nana?
Glancing sideways at Romario he sends him look, wondering if perhaps his right hand had managed to sense Tsuna, but received a denial. Neither Mafioso had sensed, or seen Tsuna enter the room. Perhaps Tsuna was more gifted then even Reborn knew. Tapping into the power of a daemon was something most people only gained after they reached adulthood. For Tsuna to be already able to use his daemon's traits was promising.
"I wanted to be sure," Nana said, patting Tsuna on the head. "Reborn has yet to apologize after all...and it wouldn't do if something happened to him before he talked to you." She said turning back to her plate.
And yet, something about she said that made goosebumps appear on Dino's skin. Was this really the same person who had warmly welcomed him into the house the day before? Her whole presence was like a completely different person.
"Are you alright?" Tsuna says coming up to Dino. He leans forward, tilting his head, looking concerned. "Kaa-san can be a little...intense when she's upset." Natsu is sitting on his right shoulder, while Tsubird is perched on Tsune's head. Both are looking at him rather concerned, for once in complete agreement.
It makes Dino smile.
"Thanks."
"Any time," Tsuna replies. "Any time."
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Finishing off, his report. Reborn hit 'send'.
He'd deal his student in a bit.
For now, he needed to get the Ninth up to speed.
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So I have feelings about bullying. Lots of them, that may or may not be seen here. Tsuna has been through some pretty terrible experiences and Reborn is just adding to Tsuna's grief. I get that KHR is supposed to be comedic, but I take issue with the fact that anyone thinks bullying is okay. It's not. Reborn needs to get his head out of his ass and listen to his student. No means no.
Also, a short chapter is short, and I regret how tiny it is. More than a chapter, this is probably more of an interlude.
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