A/N:

Okay. Okay. Holy shit. This is my first upload, not technically my first fanfic, and definitely not my first story (however I've never finished one before). Personally I prefer longer chapters, but I now realize how AWFUL it is to write long chapters.

Seriously, whoever writes long chapters is amazing. Get yerself some pancakes.

Anyways, in my humble opinion as a writer/reader, the writing of this story isn't absoluteshit. That said, I am very, VERY open to any and all criticism. Hell, since I have no self esteem, I'll even take flames. But please bear in mind that I have three and a half chapters including this one already written. If your suggestion bears truth and if I can work with it, I'll see what I can do to change and I'll even see about giving you props in the author's note! How 'bout that?!

Okay, so here's a bit of a key for Kaylin's (OC's) speech patterns.

"This is her speaking in English. Itallics mean she's really speaking English. With oomph."

"This means she is speaking in regular Japanese."

This is her thinking specifically in English in 1st person.

'This is the same in 3rd person.'

The thinking part doesn't really matter so I'll probably get lazy about that. Sorry.

OKAY. Here you go. PLEASE leave even a short review. I'll take every one into consideration.

ps beta-read for beta-read hit me up ;D

[Edit: 5/16/16] I did, indeed get lazy about it. Sorry not sorry. Also, I take back the thing about flames. I now realize that they don't generally involve actually constructive criticism.

[Edit: 4/21/18] Still lazy about it. Anyway, I've noticed that this first chapter didn't meet my current standards, and it's basically the most important chapter, being the first that prospective readers actually read. That said, I've revised it. So there.

"Ne, ne, did you hear? Apparently there's going to be a transfer student today."

Tsuna's ears perked up. He hadn't heard, yet.

"Oh, you heard that, too? I thought it might be a rumor since it's so early in the year..."

"No, I heard it, too! The teachers were talking about it in the lounge when I walked by."

So it was true? Like the others, Tsuna wondered what they'd be like. He listened further to the small crowd at the front of the class while he settled down into his seat. (He was actually on time today.)

"I heard it was a pretty foreign girl!"

"Eeh? Are you sure?"

"Of course I'm sure, I heard it myself!"

"I also heard she's from America."

"Eeeh? Do you think she'll be scary, then?"

"I doubt a pretty girl would be scary..."

"You can't be sure of something like that just because of someone's looks, you know."

"Don't Americans have short tempers, though?"

"It's probably a lack of calcium..."

"Probably."

"Nobody wants to talk about calcium!"

"I heard from someone that she has a mysterious background..."

"Eh? That definitely sounds like a rumor! Where did you hear that?"

Giggles. "Maybe she's in the mafia~"

Tsuna scoffed a little to himself; what kind of middle schooler would be in the mafia?

The door to the classroom slid open and everyone scampered to their seats, gossiping cut short. The teacher, one Nezu-sensei (Tsuna inwardly cringed at the teacher that seemed to take pleasure in humiliating him), walked to the podium and settled in, sighing like he knew this would be a long day. He then cleared his throat and glared at the class, particularly Tsuna, for whatever reason.

"Stand."

Collective scrape.

"Bow."

Whoosh.

"Be seated."

Disjointed scrapes and plops.

Nezu cleared his throat again, looking like the proceedings would be beneath him. "As I'm sure many of you are aware, a transfer student will be joining the class today." He waited impatiently for the brief whispers to die down. "They are a transfer student from America." More whispers. "Now, their Japanese may not be very good, but you are nonetheless expected to make them comfortable and help them in any way you can." He sighed and turned his head to the door.

"You may come in," he called.

Though it was quiet before, there was more of a hush as the door rattled a bit. There was a pause and a disgruntled mutter behind the door, breaking the tense atmosphere for a second. Tsuna sweat-dropped. But everyone stiffened again when the door (successfully) slid open. Tsuna cringed as horrible scenarios automatically flew through his mind as he recalled his classmates' musings of how scary she could be.

As the door slid open everyone straightened in anticipation. A trouser-clad leg swung into view, and a few students blinked. Were the rumors mistaken, then? But as the rest of the person in question stepped in, those suspicions were promptly squashed.

Said transfer student wore the male uniform: normal slacks and the simple short-sleeved version of the school dress shirt, a wristband affixed below the right elbow - no lazer in sight. Under the uniform was a distinctly feminine figure. Added to that, the long, blood red hair braided down her back and the features of her face made her gender extremely hard to miss.

She reached the teacher's side and swung her gaze of cold steel to the students. Tsuna jerked a little in his seat, as did a few classmates; those eyes were intense! It almost looked like she was glaring at them for simply existing. In contrast to her (seemingly) pissed off look, she clasped her hands in front of her and seemed to be fidgeting...

Tsuna noticed this, of course, and sweatdropped. Is she angry or nervous?

Nezu spoke after the foreign student suffered for a few seconds.

"You may introduce yourself, now."

The girl stiffened and swallowed. The class, still miraculously silent, leaned forward with bated breath.

I was nearly positive my heart was palpitating as the teacher (whose name I hadn't bothered to learn yet) called me into the classroom. I stiffened. I heard reassuring squeaks from a little friend inside of my school case. I huffed out a breath at myself and told myself I was being ridiculous.

I reached forward with a decidedly steady hand and gripped the unusual handle and pulled.

It didn't open.

Sliding door.

"Oh, Son of a bitch..."

I slowly slid the door open, plastering a neutral look over my forming frown. It had been so damn long since I was in any kind of school environment. And these kids were all Japanese. Hina had assured me that my accent wasn't absolutely horrendous, but what did she know? She couldn't physically speak it.

I squared my shoulders and swung my foot forward. It seemed there was a hush in the classroom and I fought not to purse my lips. It had been equally long since I had interacted with people this close to my own age, too. I wasn't even sure I remembered how. But that was years ago, anyways.

No immediate laughter. Good. No sniffs of disdain. Also good. No one spontaneously combusting. Very good!

All too quickly it was time for me to turn and face the possibly vicious, ravenous, bloodthirsty, demonic-

Struggling to keep my face even, I stared. They stared back. Although it looked like some of them twitched.

Don't panic, now. No reason for that.

"You may introduce yourself, now."

I stiffened. My mouth instantaneously went dry. I swallowed.

Inhale.

I just needed to introduce myself. No need to impress anyone.

Exhale.

"My name is Steele, Kaylin. Pleased to meet you."

There was immediately a small eruption of whispers as the new student introduced herself and bowed politely.

"Look at her hair!"

"I told you she was pretty."

"She doesn't seem scary..."

"But look at here eyes! She was glaring the second she walked in!"

"She's clearly just nervous."

"She's tall for a girl!"

"Holy shit, don't you think she's a babe?"

"Eh? You're into that type?"

"But look!"

"Well, her hair is really pretty."

"Are you blind? So's her face!"

"Ah, I think she's blushing." The students hushed somewhat.

Indeed, her body was stiff and she seemed to be scowling. Her right eyebrow was twitching and her cheeks had gone a pink that contrasted interestingly with her hair.

I guess she's kind of cute like that. Tsuna blinked at the thought and shook his head fervently. He glanced at Kyoko who sat near the door at the front of the classroom. She was smiling sweetly, like she usually did. Tsuna flushed a little and looked back at the board. Yeah, I definitely like Kyoko-chan.

Some of the comments I heard made me cringe. It's my hair, isn't it? Maybe I should have dyed it, after all...

I inwardly shook my head and cleared my thougths. Not happening. The brats would get used to it sooner or later.

My attention was immediately drawn to a fuzzy head that had started shaking itself. I blinked. Time for work.

Assess.

Age, approximately 13 years old. Pre-pubescent. Height, approximately 160 cm. Weight, under 50 kilograms. Muscle mass, minimal. By studying body posture and language, as well as physiological phenomena such as pulse and apparent blood pressure, it can be assumed that this male is timid in nature, but easily agitated. Current emotional state seems to be flustered.

Potential threat: zero.

Current threat: zero.

Presumed identity from memorized images and reports of demeanor:

Sawada Tsunayoshi.

I blinked. I quickly averted my gaze to avoid staring. That would be my target. No, I thought, no more targets. Not anymore. That would be the individual I would be watching and/or guarding for a while. At least until his candidacy is announced, as I knew it would be. The Ninth doesn't really have any other options. Then I'd see what I could do about joining the family.

A cleared throat. I shifted my eyes to the teacher. While that Assessment only took about three-and-a-half seconds (I was rusty, okay?), I paused long enough to appear to be dawdling. He opened his mouth to speak, but I moved before he got the chance to say much.

"Steele-san-" he started.

I shot him a look that maybe wouldn't be construed as a complete glare and interrupted him. "I'll take my seat, now." I walked over to an empty seat behind and to the left of Tsuna (I learned from my brief contact with his father that that's what he was generally called). I took my seat and gave the nearly-sputtering teacher a polite look while tilting my head in a hopefully innocent and totally not challenging way. Maybe that'd convince him that I simply didn't expect to not pick my own seat.

There were a few whispers and glances at me, a few snickers. I subtly glanced to Tsuna, who seemed to be in dead-panned disbelief. He noticed my attention and "hiiee"d a little, swinging his head around to face forward. Oops.

...Wait, what's a "hiiee"?

The (stupid-looking) teacher closed his mouth and seemed to come to some conclusion that I'm sure was somehow wrong. Oh, good. He promptly sneered at me and turned around to begin writing on the board, like the whole thing didn't happen.

Okay, I decided right then that I didn't care if I was on his good side or not. I was pretty sure he was a douchebag. Whatever. I pulled out a small, handy rectangular instant-translation device (well, there was a little lag, but that was fair). I assumed Asshat-sensei was informed of my kanji ineptitude.

I was working on it, alright?

Lunch was announced and I unceremoniously dropped my head to my desk with a great thunk. I heard Tsuna "hiiee!" and I chuckled quietly. Then my shoulders slumped some more and I raised my forehead from the desk just to drop it again with another thunk.

I pray for the soul of whoever has to fix this kid up to be a proper mafia boss.

I frowned a bit for Tsuna as well. I glanced at him through my long fringe as he began to pull out his wallet.

This one might lose some of his innocence all too early, too, I thought, remembering myself seven or so years ago...

I shook my head at the thought. Although he didn't ask for it, it was a great honor... I grimaced. I didn't even believe the sincerity of my own thoughts. Honor doesn't mean shit unless one chooses it.

Well. There wasn't a lot that could be done about it. He was going to be in the thick of the mafia world whether he wanted to be or not. He didn't get a choice. My frown deepened. That's partly what I came here for, though. Soften the blow. Watch his back. Make sure nothing like what happened to be as a kid happened to him. Among other things that I wasn't aware of, yet, I'm sure. So many unknown factors that I can barely begin to take into account. I was sure the Ninth would send someone more than qualified to train Tsuna.

Said as-of-yet unaware boy seemed to be counting money in his wallet. It's probably a good thing he doesn't know, yet. Let him live normally for as long as he can. Give him more of a childhood than I had, at least.

I smirked ironically at myself as Tsuna got up and began to walk to a door of the classroom. I sounded like a fretful parent.

I sat up and waited until he was out the door to follow him. I glanced at a few curious students by the door at the back of the classroom that Tsuna took. They flinched a little. I turned away and frowned as I reopened the door that he had closed. I wasn't passively glaring or anything, was I?

I closed the door behind me and spotted Tsuna off to my right. May as well dip a toe in the water, I thought to myself, ignoring the anxiety in my chest at talking to someone of my own volition, something I hadn't done properly in a long time.

I told my adrenal glands to not start that shit and got a move on after Tsuna. Trying not to seem so eager that I was creepy, I walk/jogged up behind him and gave him a quick tap on his shoulder. He turned with a curious look on his face. Until he saw mine, then he twitched violently and "hiiee!"d, shrinking away from me.

I blinked. "Um, Tsuna, right?" I tried a small (but genuine, honestly) smile for him.

He blinked, but didn't relax much. Although, I noted, he didn't back away any more than he already had. "H-hai?" His voice wavered.

"Are you headed to the school store?"

He straightened just a little. "Y-yes...?" His wary gaze turned more questioning. Good, I thought, that's a good sign, right?

I smiled a little more, "Would you mind showing me the way? I didn't get much time to look around the school, earlier, and I forgot to bring any lunch." My smile turned sheepish.

He seemed mildly bewildered as he answered, "Um, okay - sure...?" I grinned a bit at my small success and hurried to walk beside him as he began forward again.

I thought of starting up conversation, maybe discuss the menu of the store, but was surprised whe he said something himself.

"You're... Steele-san, right?"

I cringed. "Oh, no no no, that's too formal. Makes me nervous. Just 'Kaylin` is fine. In fact, it's prefered."

Tsuna sweatdropped, but conceded, "Th-then... Kaylin-san..."

"No '-san,' please."

"...K-Kaylin," he gamely corrected.

I smiled, satisfied. There was a bit of silence between us then. I glanced around at the socializing students in the hall, or others heading to the store or elsewhere to eat their lunch. Both Tsuna and I seemed to be drawing attention.

I raised my eyebrow a little at some of the comments.

"Hey, isn't that the transfer student?"

"What's she doing with Dame-Tsuna?"

"More like, what's Dame-Tsuna doing around her?"

This incensed my nerves a little and I sent a sharp look that particular student's way. Whispers everywhere ceased and said particular student stiffened. I blinked at the exaggerated reaction and mentally shrugged.

"Freakin' gossipy brats..." I muttered under my breath.

Tsuna, meanwhile, was a little slumped with a dead-panned look on his face. He seemed to sigh dejectedly. I frowned. I was beginning to think there was a situation here, in his school life.

We shortly arrived at the store, where there was a very small crowd around the counter. "Any suggestions?" I asked Tsuna without looking at him, already scanning the menu.

He considered for a second. "The sandwiches here aren't too ba-"

"Melon bread!" I exclaimed, grinning. I glanced down to Tsuna, who jumped in alarm, and bounced on my toes, ignoring the startled stares of various pedestrian students.

"I've always wanted to try melon bread!" I beamed. There were some bewildered and amused whispers at my enthusiasm and Tsuna sweat-dropped.

"I guess that's pretty good, too..." He seemed to be getting a little twitchy.

I then heard some snickers from somewhere behind us. My smile immediately faded to a frown as I shot a look over my shoulder and scanned the crowd with narrowed eyes. Quickly enough I made eye-contact with a few boys off to the side who were facing each other but all had their heads turned in our direction. Their smiles faded a little before a particularly ballsy one said something under his breath that had the whole group snickering again, nasty smiles on a few of their faces. My brows lowered over my eyes.

"Is there a problem?" My voice snapped over the crowd before I thought about it. But whatever. It needed to be made quickly clear that I wasn't the type to ignore that kind of crap, and I lifted my chin and raised an eyebrow in challenge. The snickers stopped in a heartbeat at the cold look on my face. I maintained eye contact until they collectively decided to scurry away and mind their own business.

I huffed and muttered, "Good choice." I clicked my tongue and turned my still-irritated gaze to Tsuna.

Which was apparently a mistake because Tsuna 'hiiee'd again, slapped the money he was holding on the counter and ran off with a sandwich. I gave a startled blink and stuttered out a half-aborted protest before he was around the corner already and out of sight.

"But why?" I half-whispered in dismay.

There were a few (not ill-natured, thankfully) laughs, and I sighed. I turned back to the counter and briefly deliberated deliberating, but mumbled "fuck it" and bought two melon breads and two half-pints of milk.

Well, that went well. He goes from twitchy to full-on panic pretty damn fast. I shrugged and started looking for a path to the courtyard. I figured I'd give him a chance to get over whatever the hell that was and just eat outside.

The weather was nice that day, anyways.

Luckily for my PE class, the weather was still nice when we went outside for some soccer the next day. I bounced on my toes in anticipation. I liked soccer. I was by no means a star player, but it was fun. Despite my eagerness, I faltered in my stretching.

It'd just be a quick game of soccer, the game won't last longer than forty-five minutes tops... I should be okay, right? I unconsciously placed a hand on my stomach. There'd been very little pain today, even after having just settled in to my apartment. Just a short game, and I'll stick to support and defense. I'll rest up afterwards if I need to.

I'll allow myself this so early into the job. I grinned to myself.

"Kyoko-chan, do you want to be team captain?"

While keeping one ear open for the boys' team on the other field, I tuned into the situation at hand. A pretty girl with short, light brown hair was wide-eyed with surprise as she pointed to herself (cutely).

"Eh? Me?" She blinked.

"Do you not want to?" Asked a girl with long, straight hair.

The pretty girl, Kyoko-chan, tilted her haid (cutely). "Wouldn't Haruka-chan be better? Or," she gasped and clapped her hands (cutely). To my immense surprise, she spun around to beam at me, "why not Kaylin-chan?"

...

"Wait, what? Err, me?"

Kyoko chirped, "Yeah!"

"I, uh."

"It's a good way to get you more personally involved with the class!" She continued beaming and - wait, were those sparkles?

I must have looked particularly constipated because one girl took pity on me, though she couldn't keep a giggle out of her voice, "I think she's shy, Kyoko-chan." Close enough.

"Eh?" Kyoko blinked at me owlishly like the possibility of me being shy or finding the process a pain in the ass hadn't occurred to her.

I briefly flapped my hands in front of my face, a mannerism I'd already picked up from the Japanese. "I, uh, don't even know anyone's names, yet - Let's just let her - er, Haruka...chan? - be captain, yeah? I'll pay attention to everyone's names and pick next time," I compromised, looking around to hopefully meet the eyes of -

An athletic-looking girl, apparently Haruka, with long straight hair in a ponytail stepped forward, and I immediately fixed her with a beseeching look. She smirked a little and easily said, "Yeah, yeah, I got it. It's usually me and Saya, anyways. Saya?" She was answered quickly when a petite, short-haired girl with freckles piped up with a "hai, hai!" and a raised hand. I heaved a sigh in relief. Too much trouble. Too much attention.

Saya shuffled her feet around a soccer ball that I hadn't noticed and surprisingly thwacked it over to me, and I reflexively stopped it with my foot. She grinned at me and cackled, "Then I pick Kei-chan!"

I blinked.

...

"Kei-chan?" I clarified after several bemused blinks.

Saya threw me a shit-eating grin and gave an affirmative. "Nn! I almost bit my tongue when I said your name before, so now you're Kei-chan!" She stated proudly with her hands on her hips, head held high.

Haruka wacked her with the back of her hand. "That's not something to look so proud for." Saya just grinned wider. (That looked like it hurt.)

Haruka rolled her eyes, then turned to face the rest of the girls and began the process of picking teams.

I wilted once relieved of the pressure and tucked the ball under my arm. Then I remembered my self-appointed charge, and glanced over to the boys' group. The two gender-segregated groups were still relatively close, so I could hear a...curious exchange between two somewhat agitated-looking boys with a rather tall individual seemingly attempting to mediate. There was a tired looking Tsuna over to the side.

"Just take him already!"

"No! I don't want my team to lose just because of him! We have a good team, this time!"

I frowned. What was going on, now?

"We don't want him over here!"

"We don't want him, either!"

My eyebrow twitched. Rude.

"Well, someone has to take him."

"Can't he just sit out?"

Oh, he didn't.

"The teams aren't even, though, he can be on-"

"Just sit out, Dame-Tsuna!"

My cheek spasmed. Without even thinking, I wound my arm back launched the soccer ball in my hands at the head of the boy who made that last remark. It connected with a resounding smack.

Oops.

It bounced off of the boys head and, with apparently very quick reflexes, the tallest boy snatched it out of the air before it could sail away. He blinked in my direction with a small, surprised frown.

"Ah, shit." I started jogging over to the boys to retrieve the ball. "Sorry! My hand slipped!"

"What the- how could your hand slipping result in the ball flying fifteen meters away?!" The boy I hit yelled incredulously while cradling his head.

"Fucking- I said I was sorry!" I stopped running to stomp my foot, crossing my arms with a huff. I wasn't sorry. At all.

The taller boy who'd caught the ball blinked before laughing and jogging to meet me half-way.

"That was a great through, you know!" He said with a grin as he held the ball out to me.

I pouted a little and snatched the ball from him. "I didn't mean to... Okay, that's a lie, but they were being jerks."

He grinned sheepishly and rubbed the back of his head. "Yeah, I tried to calm them down, but it usually happens no matter what I do..."

I leaned around his shoulder and shot the male half of the class in general a sharp glare, and many of them twitched. I gave a 'hmph' and turned my head away.

"But you should think about joining the baseball club!" He was beaming proudly. "You'd be a great addition!"

I blinked and leaned back (he was taller than me by about four inches despite being - I assumed - younger than me) and appraised him. "I take it you're in the baseball club?" I more or less stated with a raised eyebrow. He certainly looked like the athletic type. Tall son of a bitch.

"Ha ha, you guessed?"

I was about to respond when a call was heard from behind me, "Kei-chan, hurry with the ball, we're ready to play!"My eyebrow twitched at the nickname. I hoped that didn't stick.

But as if to violently tap dance all over my hopes, the boy in front of me laughed (again) and took a step back. "Seriously think about joining the baseball club!" He turned and waved. "I'm Yamamoto Takeshi, by the way. Later, Kei-chan!" I jerked in alarm but he was already jogging back to his team.

"Bu-but my name-" I was interrupted as someone grabbed the ball from me and started hauling me by the arm back to the girls' field.

"Geez, Kei-chan, you're so slow!" Saya complained with a huff.

"But my name-"

"Too late, it stuck," Saya happily (smugly) informed me. I groaned.

"Oh, come on."

The game was nearing its end, as time was almost up, and there was next to no pain in my chest. The team needed a point to break the tie. In a moment of competitiveness, I made the executive decision to abandon my post as defense to make sure that damn ball hit net. I held back a grin.

Feeling a hint of the thrill that I had missed since my earlier mafia days had stalled (it was just P.E. class, but still), I launched forward and snagged the ball out from under an opponent's feet. As everyone was expecting me to pass the ball to a forward, like I had been the entire game, there was only a person or two trying to get the ball back from me directly as opposed to intercepting the anticipated pass.

That left the field wide open for me to run the fuck away with that ball.

I tore across the field at a full sprint, finally letting a grin blossom across my face, and left most of the players (even those on my team) behind. For like a second, at least.

Saya, who I had quickly learned was in the soccer club caught on quickly and chased after me in support. Unfortunately, Haruka (also in the club) caught on just as fast and caught up just as fast and took up position to guard me. I had learned that she was also rather good at stealing the ball.

Well, crap.

When she hopped to my front to try and sweep the ball out from under me, I took a (kind of big) chance, considering I only knew how to do the move I was about to attempt in theory.

I feinted a dodge around her to the left and skidded to a halt at the same time I flicked my left ankle back, catching the ball and sending it behind me. I turned in half a second with the foot I kicked with as a pivot and launched the ball (a little off-center) to Saya, whom the defense was fast approaching. She changed direction a bit and easily compensated for my bad aim.

Luckily, the ball reached her before the opponents did, and she grinned in delight as I danced to the left and around Haruka who had instinctively gone to my right after the ball. Just a split second before the defense reached her, she passed it back to me and, not wanting to underestimate Haruka's speed, I didn't even stop to dribble the ball forward anymore before I sent it careening towards the net.

There was a collective hush on both teams as we watched the goalie make a mad leap for the ball, going nearly horizontal to the ground.

...

She caught it.

"Oh, come on!" I threw my hands in the air as the P.E. teacher called the game.

I threw my head back and groaned loudly at the sky and didn't notice the speeding teenager barreling towards me.

I was promptly glomped and assaulted with a voice in my ear.

"Kei-chan, that was awesome!" Saya squealed beside me.

"Jesus, Saya, can you not shout in my ear?!" I shouted just as loudly to try and hide my embarrassment at the praise.

She only leaned back so she could look up at me and continued, "That was intense! You even avoided Haruka! Twice!" She was absolutely radiating admiration at me even as she caught her breath. "I can barely manage that myself!"

Haruka, having just been knocked to the side by Saya laughed at that. "She's not even kidding, you know. I'm usually on her ass so fast she trips over her own feet half the time." She grinned at Saya's puffed out cheeks, then looked to me. "That aside, though, that really was a nice move..." She squinted me in apparent appraisal.

Prying myself out of Saya's vice-grip, I mumbled, "I mean, thanks, but it didn't even make it past the goalie -"

"That's hardly the point!" Saya locked eyes with me and with the straightest face said, "You should join the soccer club."

I'm sure I looked horrified when I began to object before a voice chimed in.

"I think she should join the baseball club."

I nearly snapped my neck to swing my head around, aghast to see Yamamoto looking expectantly at me.

"No, I'm-" I was interrupted again as Saya pulled me away possessively, forcing herself between Yamamoto and me.

"Don't you go recruiting her, now, I asked first!"

"Uh, really-"

"I asked her before the game even started, though."

Saya gasped, scandalized. "You cheater!"

I quickly ducked out from under Saya's arms and sidestepped away while she was distracted with Yamamoto. I kept backing away, making sure they were really occupied before slowly turning away.

I blinked in surprise when I saw a lump over in the other field. Um. I tiptoed closer, then straightened when I realized it was Tsuna lying in a heap in the grass. I started forward over to him before I paused, remembering how he ran from me like I was holding an ax in one hand and a severed head in the other yesterday.

...I'm sure more than twenty-four hours is enough for him to recover.

I continued over to him and cast a glance over my shoulder. Everyone was making their way inside, Saya one-sidedly arguing with an amused-looking Yamamoto while nearing the door. Assured that the cost was clear, I turned back, leaned down and poked Tsuna's fluffy head. I had to step back as he weakly turned his head to look at me and sprung to his feet, standing at attention.

"Hiiie! Ste- K-Kaylin!"

I blinked at his surprise, but smiled as I noted that he used my first name."You remembered to call me Kaylin," I pointed out, trying easy conversation.

He blinked at me this time. "Y-yeah..."

I rolled my eyes and clapped his shoulder once. "Relax, Tsuna, I won't maul you."

He looked entirely unconvinced as he replied, "Y-yeah..."

I inwardly wilted and sighed. This was going to require some work. And probably a little TLC.

And dear god there it is.

Again, any and all reviews would be greatly appreciated. Even just a few words. I'll work out upload times if I see that this is even somewhat well-recieved.

WELL, THEN.

ADIEU~

[Edit: 5/16/16] I fixed a few errors in grammar and some weird thing with vegitables in plants. Don't ask. I'll be doing some editing in a few later chapters, one change of which will likely up the maturity rating to 'M,' primarily because of gore.

So, that's coming soon. Might even be done before you read this edit!

[Edit: 4/22/18] So I didn't do the rating change. 'M' implies stuff and this fic is none of that stuff because everyone's in middle school. Like shit.

I should make some better cover art for this thing.