"When you come out of the storm, you won't be the same person who walked in. That's what this storm's all about."
― Haruki Murakami, Kafka on the Shore

-ooo-
THEN
DAYS UNTIL EXECUTION: 123
ELSEWHERE/NAMIMORI
February 22, 2003

TSUNAYOSHI

He must have fallen asleep.

That had to be it.

Though he wasn't all that sure why it would have happened, really, since he hadn't even been all that tired in the first place, but there wasn't really any other explanation that made sense.

It wasn't as if he'd never fallen asleep in class before, but it had been a while. With Reborn popping up unannounced and always keeping such a close eye on him, he always felt nervous, jittery, especially in class. Like he was always waiting for the other embarrassing shoe to drop.

It never actually helped, of course.

The really crazy things only happened when he least expected them, when he'd already dropped his guard and relaxed, so if he were looking for something to happen it almost guaranteed nothing would.

Which would have been fine... except if he ever let himself think that than he'd definitely relax and something would.

It was a vicious, stupid cycle.

Still, it kept him awake and alert in class, even if it didn't make him any better at concentrating or learning the material. He was still always caught off guard when the teacher called on him and Gokudera was constantly trying to get his attention to give him the answers to the questions, which was nice of him, but always made him feel like a real charity case.

Though, he supposed that wasn't really that far from the truth.

Even after almost a year of Reborn's efforts to make him better than he was, he was still failing most subjects. He wasn't failing them quite as badly as before, but failing was still failing and so he continued the inevitable trudge towards advancement and another year of disappointing everyone who cared about him with his inability to improve in any meaningful way.

He really wasn't sure why Reborn kept bothering with him at all when he was clearly beyond help. His scores on his last exams had been awful and he was pretty sure there was no way he would manage to improve enough to catch up by the year's end. He wondered vaguely whether if he just kept falling further and further behind he'd actually start regressing completely at some point. If he forgot how to read or do even the most basic math problems would that finally be enough to get everyone to give up on him once and for all?

At least no one would be expecting a total dropout loser who couldn't even read to be some kind of mafia big shot.

So, there was a definite upside to being a failure at least.

Though, with his luck, they'd probably want him anyway.

"...Sawada!"

He startled badly as the instructor called his name.

For what was probably not the first based on how red his face was.

Crap.

"Uh, sorry, sir, um, what was the question?"

His classmates laugh while their instructor merely gives him a look of long suffering that seems one step short of an eye roll.

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Gokudera gesturing frantically to him behind the cover of his notebook, but he no idea what any of those hand signals actually meant, if they meant anything at all.

"I asked you to come up here and complete the sentence on the board."

Because of course he did.

He stares at the chalkboard, stomach sinking as he realizes that he recognizes one word out of the eight words on the board.

Lion.

He has absolutely no idea why the word 'lion' would have stuck with him when he somehow managed to forget all the other words Reborn had tried to teach him, but there it is.

Lion.

What did the lion do?

Why did the lion do it?

Was there hunter involved?

Maybe the hunter could kill both him and the lion and put them both out of their misery?

Didn't seem likely.

He pushed himself up out of his seat and began the long, slow walk to inevitable humiliation while Gokudera whispered encouragement at his back.

Ugh.

Why couldn't the ground just open up and swallow him or something?

And, of course, he hadn't been able to, because of course he hadn't and in the end he slunk back to his desk, ears and face burning as he ducked his head to avoid Yamamoto's commiserating smile and Gokudera's incredibly embarrassing 'nice try, boss'.

As soon as he was seated again he'd dropped his head on the desk hoping to at least avoid the temptation to look over at Kyouko until the worst of the heat had left his face and the rest of the classes gleeful titters had finally died down. He really didn't think she was one of the people laughing at him, but he really didn't want take the chance of looking and finding out she was.

The instructor went back to his lecture and his classmates eventually quieted down and the class continued to pass and he should probably pay attention this time, but he couldn't quite summon the will. His face still felt overheated and the desktop was cool against his cheek.

It wasn't like the instructor would call on him again anyway. For better or worse he'd had his shot and blown it like he always did. At least now he'd be content to leave him alone until lunch at least.

It wasn't much, but it was better than nothing.

Of course, it would be nice if he could get something right for once.

Anything at all would do.

So he must have fallen asleep like that, face down, probably drooling across his desk and any chance he'd had of avoiding the burn of humiliation twice in one morning while their instructor droned on and on about things he should have been paying attention to.

That had to have been what happened, because he really can't think of how the heck else he might have ended up standing in a quiet forest, shivering in his school uniform as snow gusted around him.

"Hello?" He'd called, but the whistle of the wind through the trees seemed to steal the sound away, just eat it all up the moment the word passed his lips. He tried again and again, but the result was the same every time.

And it was really, really cold.

He hugged his arms around his chest, hopping from foot to foot and wishing he'd dreamed of something warmer or at least dreamed himself up a jacket or something.

He pinched his cheek, tweaking the skin hard and was only a little surprised that he didn't wake up.

Perfect.

Even his dreams hated him today.

After another minute of standing around freezing his butt off, he finally just started walking. He couldn't see anything except trees and snow and more trees and snow, but even if he didn't find anything it was worth the effort just to keep warm.

Except every step was a battle, the snow was heavy and wet and thick and so deep that he could barely lift his leg high enough to take actual steps. It took half a dozen panting, sweating, heaving steps before he realized that it was just easier to wade through it like he was wading through water.

Really, really, cold, heavy, horrible, slushy water.

And his hands were red and numb from flailing in the snow and looked, for some reason, ridiculously small. Like little kid small and he ended up tucking them away in his armpits, but it didn't really help much.

He squinted against the flurry of ice and snow the wind threw in his face.

He'd never been in a snowstorm before, not a real snowstorm, but if this was what they were like… he really never wanted to be.

He'd barely gone more than a few feet and already the tip of his nose was numb and his eyes were tearing up, but it was so cold that the tears kept freezing on his lashes.

"Hello?" He tried again and again there was nothing but the howl of the wind to greet the sound and swallow it down.

But….

He was pretty sure he could hear someone crying….

"Boss?"

Gokudera's voice broke through the dream like a lightning strike, shattering the world around him and he startled awake, flailing and barely managing to catch his balance before he tipped over backwards.

"Wha-what?!" He managed, steadying his a body in the way he couldn't quite steady his racing heart.

He had no idea what his face looked like, but it must have been bad because when he looked up at him Gokudera's frowning, concerned expression crumbled the same way Lambo's did when he was denied candy. "I'm so sorry, boss! That was… oh, man, I shouldn't have woken you like that! Should I have let you sleep? No wonder you got that question wrong if you're so tired you fell asleep in class!"

"No, no, it's fine," he replied, waving his hands frantically as if that might do something to stave off Gokudera's sudden panic. He always floundered in the face of Gokudera's insistence on attributing his many failings to anything but the fact that he just sucked at life, never quite able to bring himself to correct him.

Though even when he tried, Gokudera usually didn't really hear him.

So, most of the time, he just ended up laughing along and agreeing with whatever logic pretzels he came up with just to get him to stop and change the subject. It always made him feel like one day Gokudera would finally realize he was actually an idiot after all and take off back to Italy in search of a leader who wasn't.

Not that he wanted to be Gokudera's leader, but he didn't want him to leave either.

It was confusing.

Fortunately this time, Yamamoto arrived beside them before Gokudera could really get going. He laughed as he leaned back against one of the neighboring desks and his presence instantly reset Gokudera's expression from flustered to eyebrow-twitching annoyance as he turned to glare at the taller boy. "And what are you laughing at, eh?"

"No wonder I have so much trouble with this stuff. I fall asleep in class all the time too," Yamamoto replied, his smile wide, arms folded behind his head.

"No, you have so much trouble because you're an moron, baseball idiot." Gokudera snarled up at him, tilting his head back, fingers fidgeting out a lighter from his pocket.

He'd still never been able to quite sell Gokudera on the idea that dynamite wasn't okay to use at school. Not that he liked the idea of him using it anywhere, period, but he liked to pick the battles he thought he stood a chance of winning when it came to Gokudera.

Thoughts filled with images of desks flying and exploding windows, he swiped the sleeve of his jacket across his desk quickly in the hopes of catching any possible drool and stood, grabbing his lunch box from his desk before reaching out to catch Gokudera's free hand and tug him away towards the door.

"Why don't we go get some lunch?" He asked, hoping that the distraction of food might be enough to derail the one-sided argument. He probably had enough money to buy him some bread if he needed to since Gokudera sometimes forgot to bring anything with him to eat during break.

"Yeah, o-of course, Boss," he replied and when he glanced back at him he found Gokudera was still scowling down at the ground, his face still a little red the way it usually got when he was overexcited or angry, but at least he wasn't glaring at Yamamoto anymore.

He turned his face up to offer Yamamoto a smile where he was still lingering near his desk staring after them. "I need to go buy something. Would you guys mind coming with me?"

"Sure," Yamamoto said his smile brightening as he fell into step behind them and Gokudera, still looking a little flustered, immediately began grouching at him for being too close.

Well, at least he'd put the lighter away.

-ooo-
NOW
DAYS UNTIL EXECUTION: ?
THE GANG
TRADITORE

MUKURO

He awoke to find himself in their cell, the dim emergency lights in the corridor beyond the only enough illumination to lighten the shadows across the floor and deepen those beneath on the bed where he sat, leaning against the wall with Ken's head in his lap and a keen awareness that he had no idea what day it was. He'd been dreaming again. Dreaming and remembering and his skin itched, uncomfortable and far too tight, as if it didn't quite fit right anymore.

He could see the dark of Marie's hair spread across the pillow across the aisle, blanket pulled up over her face so only the barest pale line of her forehead was visible. It seemed unusual to see her sleeping, she so often startled awake at his presence or specifically stayed up to pepper him with pointless questions and needle his fraying nerves with awkward conversation.

Everything was jumbled up in his mind, untidy, scenes and fragments of memory piled high in all the corners, teetering and precarious, waiting to tumble down on him at any moment.

How much time had passed since the last time he spoke with her?

How much since the last time he woke here?

The knowledge trembled uncertain in his mind, wavering and fragile as smoke. Every time he woke it seemed as if he were somewhere different with only the most cursory grasp on what day it was, on what he'd been dreaming about, what he'd been doing.

It was terrifying… or at least it should have been, but it felt disconnected, unreal, as if it belonged to someone else, just a residual dread that lingered in his veins, a fading fear that barely belonged to him at all.

If it wasn't Ken's bed it was the floor beside Chikusa's in the infirmary. Or if it were a particularly bad day, he'd wake up to find himself leaning against the door of his old cell down in solitary.

Sometimes he'd be covered in dirt or stripped down to his underwear, soaking wet and freezing on the cold concrete.

Sometimes it took him ages to remember how he'd gotten there and, even when -if- he did remember, he could still never be completely certain whether he had actually remembered or whether he had just made something up to make himself feel better about it.

Though he never truly felt better.

It was getting more and more difficult to feel anything at all anymore as if his emotions were slowly being overloaded and disconnected until nothing remained of who he had been.

"Mukuro?"

Lancia's voice was always soft and familiar and sometimes he'd talk for minutes or hours about nothing. Telling him old stories he didn't want to hear again or terrible jokes he'd heard while he'd worked at that pawnshop in New York. Stupid American jokes that neither of them fully understood, but he'd tell them anyway and Mukuro would try not to give him the satisfaction of groaning when he'd pause dramatically after the punchline as if he to cue laughter he never received.

"What's the temperature inside of a tauntaun?"

He would always silently count out the moments and wonder if Lancia cared that he already knew the answer, if he offered the joke in hopes of pulling it from him.

"Lukewarm."

They weren't funny.

They weren't funny at all.

"What does Pooh bear call his girlfriend?"

One. Two. Three.

"Honey."

They never got better. He only knew ten or so and he always told them in a run, never one at a time, as if that was just the way it was supposed to go. As if he were reading from a script.

Still.

There'd always been something about the sound of his voice that….

It didn't matter.

He'd spent so much time when he was small listening to the sound of Lancia's voice, quiet words spoken outside open doors late at night.

Had Lancia slept at all during those first few weeks? Had he caught naps in the afternoon so he could stay up all night to offer a running commentary to distract him for the shadows crawling across still unfamiliar floors and walls.

Why?

It had never made sense to him.

It made even less sense now.

Lancia would talk and talk until his voice was hoarse and even after. He'd never fall silent while he was still there. For all he knew Lancia might have even kept it up long after he picked himself up and stumbled out of solitary in search of a shower or sleep or different company.

Most of the time he left without ever responding….

But not always….

Sometimes he'd find himself tripping into conversation, into the familiar banter that had characterized much of their years together.

They never talked about anything real, anything substantial, not really.

Or if they did, he'd forgotten all about it, swept it into the corners of his mind with the rest of the junk he couldn't find the motivation to sort out.

As far as he knew, Lancia never asked him about Ken or Chikusa and sometimes he liked to pretend it was because he didn't care and not because he didn't trust him to tell him the truth.

More often Lancia coaxed him into conversation about nonsense, meaningless things.

"This is supposed to be a dick, right?" Lancia had asked one day and he could hear his fingers tapping against the wall and it was easy enough to picture what he was looking at.

"What do you mean supposed to be? It's obviously a dick," he inquired, remembering the obscene drawings he'd begun carving into the walls during the long months of his incarceration.

A soft scratching sound filled the space between them as Lancia snorted, "It isn't obviously anything, shithead. Could be a fucking corn silo or a really shitty space ship for all I'd know from just looking at it. You gotta add the balls or it could just be any damn thing, really, and then what the hell's the point of that? Didn't they teach you anything at murderous delinquent school?"

"I'm afraid the art program at the Murderous Delinquent Education Center just isn't what it used to be during your day, Mr. Lancia. Budget cuts. The alumni are simply terrible at fundraising."

"It's all about standards, kid. You wouldn't want the next joker who ends up in this cell to be confused about what you were trying to say, would you? It's all fine and well to want to let folks know that you want your guards to eat a giant bag of dicks, but this could just as easily be a bag of lollipops or like some really shitty, half-finished flowers."

"You do realize that I didn't put you in there to critique my art skills, correct?"

"Yeah, I figured, but since I don't have anything better to fucking do that's what you're gonna get. Next time you decide to visit, bring me a fucking book or something to keep me occupied. If you ask real nicely, I might even read some of it to you if you're looking to hear something a bit different than the same old stories."

"Mr. Lancia?"

"Yeah, kid?"

He didn't mean to say it. Didn't even mean to think it, but the words still slipped out, strange and fond and true.

"I'm going to miss you."

He should have played them off, should have quantified them with an insult to make them less meaningful… less sincere. But when he opened his mouth, grasping for something, any words at all, panic rose up in his throat to strangle anything else he might have said.

"Kid?" Lancia's voice was close, quiet and concerned. "You okay?"

No.

He wasn't okay.

He'd never been okay.

He scrambled up, shoving away from the door, scrapping bare feet and bloody palms against the rough stone as he fled.

He didn't remember leaving the block.

Didn't remember what he did after.

Wasn't sure any of it had happened at all.

Everything was like that now.

Days, moments, hours, weeks bleeding into each other and falling away and he understood, in moments like these when the world was calm and his thoughts ran in a single direction for once, that he had made a mistake. That stirring all that up, fishing around for answers to questions he hadn't even really understood, would inevitably prove a fatal error.

That he'd be lucky if he didn't take them all down with him when he finally went completely mad.

Sometimes he thought about the scalpels in the Infirmary, about the needles that were still hidden beneath Chikusa's skin.

It would be an easy out, a messy end, but infinitely better than the possibility of what he might do once he stopped having these lucid moments, once he stopped being able to tell truth from fiction, distinguish ally from foe.

Ken stirred and blinked up at him and he wasn't sure how much time had passed… minutes? Seconds? Hours? Days? Was this the same day or a different one?

Did it matter?

"Hey. You look kind of freaked out. You okay?" Ken murmured sleepily and Mukuro nodded sharply even though they both knew it was a lie.

Ken watched him for another moment, his gaze clearing as sleep faded beneath the weight of wakefulness. "It's February twenty-second," he ventured finally, his voice soft and steady. "It's a Saturday so there'll be lasagna for dinner. It's not awful. There's also salad, but they use too much vinegar in the dressing. So that's fucking nasty. You should probably try to choke it down anyway. You haven't been eating." He poked him in the ribs and he batted the hand away irritably. "You look like shit. How's Chikusa?"

"Healing," Mukuro replied, because that was the only safe answer. The only thing that wasn't a lie and he hated the way Ken nodded and turned his gaze away. Hated that awkward little quirk of a smile on his lips that felt like ground glass with the way it grated against his nerves.

"Good, yeah, that's good," he mumbled nodding to himself.

He'd stopped asking to be taken in to see him at some point. He wasn't sure when, just that he'd been grateful for it. He was pretty sure he hadn't let it slip that Chikusa had asked him not to bring him, but it was difficult to be sure. Things got mixed up and turned around so he could never be certain of anything.

"Were you dreaming?" He asked and he wondered if it was idle curiosity or actual interest that made him ask. If he were trying to worry out the cause of his distress or just bored. It was sometimes difficult to tell with Ken… or maybe he just wanted it to be. The weight of Ken's concern had always been difficult to bear.

"Remembering," he answered honestly, because there was no reason not to tell him. The memory was still close, prickling beneath his skin with the smell of gunpowder and the cold, wet of winter snow. "The cabin," he cleared his throat, pitching his voice low. "Almost killing you at the cabin."

Ken huffed out a frustrated sigh and shifted away to sit up and lean back against the wall beside him, probably just he could glare at him on equal terms. "Why do you always do that? I mean, seriously, you didn't do anything. Even if you thought about it, you didn't actually do it. You must just really like wallowing in guilt, because I don't know why the hell else you insist on dwelling on this shit the way you do. I mean, I think about doing shit all the time. I think about killing the guards and gutting that guy down the row who stares at M's butt all the time and I think about sneaking back in the kitchen to take a piss in that shitty soup they serve on Fridays.

"What I'm saying is that I think about all kinds of stuff, but I don't actually do any of it so I don't stress myself out about what I could have done, because in the end I didn't and that's what matters, right? So, you didn't almost kill us at the stupid cabin."

"I don't think you realize how close a thing it was."

"Whatever. You still didn't hurt anyone but yourself. I mean, seriously, you flipped your shit like a giant drama queen because you thought about maybe hurting us. Fuck, I can't believe you're still freaking out about it. It's been like, what? Almost ten freaking years, right? Anyway everything was fine in the end, even if it was a pretty dick move. Plus, the rest of the night wasn't so bad, right? At least you assholes seemed to be having a pretty good time while I bled all over the kitchen. Chikusa kept throwing fucking marshmallows that smelled like stale, sooty butt at me and I remember you laughing pretty damn hard about it. 'Course then we all went back to sleep and you woke us up screaming like two hours later because you had just the worst fucking night terrors back then."

"We all did," Mukuro answered, hiding a smile against the back of his hand. It had been rare during that first year when they hadn't all been woken up several times a night by screams or flailing limbs. It was part of the reason he'd made a point of sleeping as little as possible.

Ken snorted, shrugging as a grin tugged at his lips, "Yeah, I guess so. But you know what I remember most about that day?"

"What?"

"That was the first time you let us get really close to you like that. We'd been hauling our asses all over the countryside for months and we'd even killed that little Famiglia in the foothills and, I mean, it was a mess, but we did it, right? And you still wouldn't even let us even stand that close to you half the time."

"In all fairness, you usually smelled pretty terrible."

"Oh, shut up, Chikusa made me wash up all the damn time."

"Once or twice a week does not qualify as 'all the time', it barely even qualifies as 'often enough'."

"Yeah, whatever. I still though, for like a long time, that you thought you were gonna catch something from us or something or maybe you just didn't like us, so maybe you only kept us around because we were useful."

"Oh."

"Yeah, sorry. Chikusa was the one who figured out you were trying to look out for us."

"Chikusa did?"

"I know, crazy, right? Usually I'm the insightful one."

Mukuro stifled a laugh against the back of his hand.

"Oh, shut the fuck up. Anyway, you kept doing all this dangerous shit, taking all these stupid risks yourself, like with that fucking bullet. You could do all this stuff we didn't really understand and you were scary and powerful and it made me, us, feel safe most of the time. But then you'd do this crazy, reckless stuff and it would scare the hell out of us. I think we were always waiting for the other shoe to drop, you know? For you to get yourself killed, because you… during those first months you always acted like you had to do it yourself and like you didn't even care if you made it through or maybe like you hoped you did. Sometimes it seemed like you didn't want to be there, to be anywhere. Like just fucking breathing was a chore."

"Did I?" He asked softly, but he could tell he wasn't listening, too caught in his own thoughts.

"I mean, that place was bad for us, all of us, but it was worse for you."

Ken glanced over at him suddenly and he looked… scared and somehow seeing that look in his eyes was like stepping off a cliff, like plummeting to earth with no chance of survival. He didn't know what he was going to say, not really, but he knew it would change things.

"Don't," he whispered, but Ken was already speaking, fast and whisper soft, spilling the words out like they were a confession, a burden he'd carried for years. Each one slammed down heavy and solid as stone to form the beginnings of a wall between them.

"I could smell you all over the place in there and upstairs too. You lived there. They brought us there, took us from our homes and shoved us into those labs. We were there for weeks, months maybe and they were horrible, really fucking awful, but you… you lived in that house. You'd been there for years, you had to be, I mean, those rooms, those halls were so thick with your scent. I don't know what they did to you, but… that whole damn house was just fucking rank with fear. Your fear and it was… I…."

"You never said anything. You never even thought about it," he's not sure if he means it to come out as an accusation. For the words to burn in his throat, harsh and unforgiving, but they do. He'd… it had never occurred to him that Ken would keep secrets from him, from them, much less that he could.

Ken shook his head, laughing low and shaky, "You guys always act like I can't keep a secret, but I've been keeping your secrets for fucking years. I'm not always great at it, but when it really, really matters… I manage okay. And that night… I was so fucking scared. I was so fucking scared that you'd finally decided you were done and it was my fault. And, I mean, what the fuck were we supposed to do without you? You got us out and you kept us safe and we couldn't do anything for you to help you, to stop you. We couldn't do anything for you that mattered. And it fucking sucked. And even when I realized you were still alive I… I was so scared that you wouldn't come back, that it was my fault for not stopping you, for not taking the gun out of your bag or maybe for… for making things worse for you with that fucking Christmas bullshit. I mean, I knew I shouldn't have tried to do the Christmas thing; I knew we weren't… but I thought… it was stupid. I was stupid. I don't think Chikusa even realized that's what it was, but you did and you looked so fucking freaked out. Like I'd punched you in the freaking throat or something and I just-"

"It was the first gift I'd ever gotten," he cut in, stopping the stream of Ken's words and startling him back into reality. He could feel his wide-eyed stare even as he purposefully glared down at his hands to avoid looking at him.

"What like ever? Like ever ever?"

"Ever," Mukuro confirmed, pulling his knees up against his chest and resting his cheek against them, turning his head away to face the darkness at the back of the cell. "F-Father didn't believe in presents. He had people purchase things I might need to develop, I think. Necessary things. I… never had many toys, such as they were, nothing that didn't have some sort of practical use or application. I learned to read from textbooks and instruction manuals, from newspapers and cereal boxes. I didn't even really understand the concept of presents until I was…" He paused, trailing off into uncertainty. There were still many things he didn't know, might never know. He waved an impatient hand in the air between them as if that might vanish the unease of all those blank spaces.

The silence that came after was oppressive, irrationally irritating and he chanced a glance back at Ken to find him still staring at him, as he'd known he would be, looking gob smacked. He felt that irritation slowly turning to anger in his chest as he narrowed his eyes, fingers biting into his thighs, "…what."

It wasn't quite a question.

He wasn't even sure what it was about that look was making him angry, just that it was.

Ken looked more confused than ever, hesitant and unsure and that anger burst into rage, boiling through him so fast and hot he was surprised it didn't blister his skin. He was gritting his teeth so hard they hurt as he managed to grind out another demand, "What."

"It's just…" Ken began, slowly, hesitantly, his voice as cautious as his expression. "You never talk about… about before. You've always… I've always…"

Before… right.

He'd been… remembering.

Before there'd been nothing but blank space and the occasional disjointed images of nightmares. And now... now there was...raw edges and painful splatters of emotion. It was still a puzzle with far too many missing pieces, but he could see its shape now, the vague impression of form and the substance within.

"I told you I was… I…" He trailed off, suddenly uncertain.

Had he told him- them- what he was doing? He'd meant to, but… that meant nothing. Intention meant nothing without follow through.

Had he told them?

Warned them?

Maybe?

Or had that… had that all been a dream too? A dream or a memory? What was this? Were they really here at all? Talking like this? Or was he somewhere else? Someone else? Dreaming this up? He… he couldn't quite… there was something he was supposed to be doing and he couldn't… he couldn't quite….

His head ached, sharp and sudden and then the moment shattered like glass around him. And there was a dizzying tilting whirl of vertigo and the shadows bled and swirled around him before settling back into place. They were close again, too close. Ken's head in his lap once more and he was nodding up at him as if they were in the midst of conversation, calm, smiling, as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened and everything was fine.

He was stroking his fingers through his hair, gentle and fond and not at all on the verge of ripping it out.

Which was a strange thought.

Had he been angry?

Yes?

No?

It seemed like he had been, but...

He wasn't certain.

Ken just nodded up at him as if he understood and maybe he did, at least a little bit about… something.

But he wasn't sure what.

This wasn't...

What had they been talking about?

Why...?

"It's funny. I never got fun presents when I was living with my Grandma. She didn't have a lot of money and she had a lot of grandchildren and so we all got like sweaters and shit. Copies of videos she picked up at a discount at the shop. She didn't have a VCR so I never actually got to watch them though. I think the idea was I'd take them over and watch them at my cousins' place, but… that didn't ever happen. We didn't really get along. So, anyway, since I couldn't watch them, I'd line the boxes up on the little dresser where I kept my clothes and stuff and pretend they were, I don't know, art or something. I'd make up stories to go with them too and, man, I saw one of them on TV when we were in New York and my story was like a zillion times better so I'm actually kinda glad I couldn't watch them now. So, anyway, I used to watch a lot of TV programs at her place, because she had a TV that worked alright if you whacked it a couple of times and the people on the television always gave each other gifts. Like, you know, good gifts that really meant something and there'd be smiles and everyone seemed to like people more after they got things like that and I thought... that's what families do. And I just… I wanted to have that with you guys."

"Sap," Mukuro muttered, rolling his eyes.

"Grinch. So, can we do it next year? Like for real? Like cut down a tree and put up lights and shit? Give presents and stuff and not get all weird about it?"

"You're assuming we won't be in jail or dead at that point?"

"Yeah, I mean, obviously we won't be. Everything is obviously we're gonna get out of here and things are gonna be perfect in the new place and we'll be happy and safe and everything will be great. Don't look at me like that. I can be optimistic," Ken's grin was ridiculously wide.

"I suppose one of us has to be," Mukuro replied, closing his eyes and letting his head fall back against the wall. Sometimes Ken's enthusiasm was exhausting and his head still hurt. "Do whatever you want."

"Lancia too?"

Mukuro glanced back down to find Ken watching him, cautious and expectant, practically wiggling with the desire to ask. "What?"

"He could be back here. He isn't and I just… what happened?"

Mukuro shrugged, expression carefully blank, "Lancia is in solitary."

"Yeah, I figured, but that isn't really a reason, right? I mean, you're walking around posing as a guard so it's not like you couldn't-"

"I don't want to talk about Lancia."

"But…."

"Why do you even care?" He could feel the anger flaring back to life like Ken's confusion was a stick stirring the ashes of a dying fire.

Anger?

Had he been angry before?

He wasn't sure.

Still, he glared down at Ken with narrowed eyes. "When did he become so important to you?"

Ken frowned, "He's not… I mean, it's just he's… he's one of us. We need him, right?'

"No," Mukuro snapped, pain shooting through him as he slipped from one realm to another so that he could shove Ken off his lap and dump him on the floor.

"Mukuro? What the hell…?" Ken sputtered, scrambling to catch himself and just managing to avoid cracking his jaw against the concrete.

Mukuro just stared at him, the heat of anger turning to something deeper, infinitely colder. "Mr. Lancia is not one of us. He has never been one of us and you'd do well to remember that. And we don't need him."

"Since fucking when?"

"Excuse me?"

"He's been with us for years! He takes care of us, doesn't he? So… why are you acting like this all of a sudden? What's going on?"

And all he can hear is an echo of not good enough, never good enough like a punch to the gut. Because he wouldn't care about Lancia so much if he were just...

No, that wasn't...

He couldn't think.

Everything felt wrong and he couldn't think past the ache in his chest and words are spilling from his lips like water.

"He only does that because I force him to," he replies quickly, panic sizzling in his veins. "He's only ever helped us because he doesn't have a better option available to him."

"Oh, bullshit. You know that isn't true! You can't make people…."

"Can't I?" He hissed, digging fingers into his legs, desperation making him frantic to end this conversation before he hurts him.

Because he's going to hurt him, of course he is.

Its inevitable, it always has been.

He'll hurt him, rip him to pieces with all the things he shouldn't say. It'll be simple, so simple, so satisfying to watch him cringe and flinch and ache and break.

After all, in the end, doesn't he always destroy everything he loves?

"How do you know? Do you think I tell you everything? I lie all the time, to everyone. Everyone, but myself most of all. How do you think I keep us safe? Keep us well? Keep us fed? What makes you think you're special? That you know everything there is to know about me just because you cling to me like you do? It makes me sick. You make me sick. You make him sick too. That's why I haven't taken you to see him, you know? He doesn't want to see you. You almost got him killed because you have a crush on him. He almost got himself killed because he'd rather die than live without you. You both disgust me. All I've done to save you and you'd throw it away for… for what? Do you think you love each other? Do you even know what that means? You've never been loved. Never been cared for by anyone but each other. That's not love, that's just codependence. It's pathetic, you're both pathetic."

Ken's expression is blank. His face is always so expressive, so open, but now it's shuttered, closed, hidden away from him.

The taste of bile is thick in his mouth and he wants to stop, but he can't.

He can't.

"Mukuro? Why... Why are you doing this?"

"Because we aren't friends. We aren't family. We aren't anything but convenient allies. You're mine. You belong to me. You're just… just property. Tools to be used. Your lives belong to me. Mine to use and discard as I see fit and you'd do well to remember that. Don't make the mistake of thinking you know me. Of thinking I care for you. I do t. I don't. I don't care about either of you. Any of you. You're just convenient. I don't care about you anymore than you care about me. So don't pretend that this, any of this is more than what it is. You're not special and you're lucky I haven't alr-"

"You're a fucking liar, you know that?" Ken snapped, shoving to his feet and throwing a punch that Mukuro easily dodged, smirking at the attempt. "You're just fucking scared!"

He laughed and it felt good, cathartic. It was better like this. He was better like this. "Am I? What do I have to be scared of, Ken Joshima? You? Lancia Salvatore? Chikusa Kakimoto? You're all just pawns. Just toys. I can be anything, be anyone, go anywhere. There is no secret I can't uncover. No stone I can't overturn. I can make anyone, anywhere do precisely as I wish. I can make daughters and sons kill their parents, parents kill their children, make lovers betray everything they profess to care about. I could make you do anything I wish. I could make you lose control. I could make you kill him, both of them, if I were so minded. It wouldn't even be hard."

"No, you…"

"Do you really want to test me, Ken? Do you?"

"No, I…"

"Good. Go to sleep."

"Mukuro, don't…!"

"I said, go to sleep," he snarled and he could see him fight it, struggle to keep his eyes open, to stay conscious, but in the end he dropped like a rock, tipping forward to fall boneless against him.

He caught him, more reflex than intention, his head landing awkwardly against his shoulder, his weight knocking the air from his lungs into a startled gasp and he had to switch realms to keep from falling back under the sudden pressure.

He was breathing raggedly as he cut his eyes to the girl peering out from under her blanket, clearly awakened by their argument. "And just what do you think you're looking at?"

Marie shrugged one shoulder, the blanket falling away as she sat up, "I'm just curious: exactly who do you think you're protecting by saying all that shit? Them or yourself?"

He chuckled, shaking his head wearily as he slid Ken back onto the bed, yanking his legs up and shoving him beneath his own blanket before standing, the sound of his spine cracking loud as a gunshot, he laughed a little harder at the way she flinched away from him, startled by the sound.

He was so tired.

So very tired.

"If I give you an extra ten thousand this month will you just shut up and leave it alone?"

She snorted, rolling her eyes before nestling warily back down beneath her blanket. "Done."

-ooo-

He's seated at the formal dining table, the wood gleaming beneath the bright sunlight streaming in through the big windows that had lined the room.

Matteo was seated at the other end, dressed in the same dark suit he'd been wearing that day. His hands tremble, tremors brought on more by age than nerves, as he slices into the roast before him and blood fills the plate, red and black, spilling over the edge to stain the white of the fancy white, embroidered tablecloth.

All the seats between them are filled with the faceless dead. Not nameless, he thinks, because if pressed he was certain he would still be able to name them all with no trouble at all. For now, however, they are inconsequential, just inconsistent blobs of color in fancy suits and dresses. Gnarled, decaying hands playing at life as they bang rusting silverware against empty, dusty plates.

The meal laid out on the table between them all is rotting. Flies buzz thick and black over every reeking, stinking bowl and platter, maggots curl and squirm in the carcasses of animals, fall across the tarnished silver. He has no plate of his own, he is ever the unwanted, uninvited guest and he belongs here no more than he has every belonged anywhere. His fingers rest, stained red with the blood of the dead against the tablecloth.

He wants to leave, but there's nowhere to go.

Every other time he looks across the table to meet his vacant gaze, Matteo's face it was desiccated, hollow, devastated by the delay of years.

"Why do you keep him?" Matteo asked finally as if they're continuing a conversation from long ago. His voice is a dry, dusty, empty echo and he shivers at the sound.

"What?" He heard himself ask, certain he'd never intended to speak as he pressed his hands- small, rough childish hands- flat against the white cloth, leaving more stains behind.

"My Lancia," the voice shivered like leaves in a chill breeze.

"He isn't yours any longer," he whispered, fingers bunching against the cloth, smearing the prints into something unrecognizable. "I keep him because he belongs to me."

"No, that's why you keep them."

"I don't…"

"We treated you as family. We would have kept you safe. We would have taken them in too. You lie to yourself and tell yourself that you did it for them, but that's not really true, is it? You just wanted to keep them. You were afraid they would leave if they had options."

His breath comes panicked and he wants to leave, wants to cover his ears, but his hands are stuck against the cloth and that voice seems to come from everywhere and nowhere, inescapable. "Afraid that they would leave and you would be alone once more. You were right, you know. They would have. They would have left you. They know you're dangerous. They didn't trust you then, they still don't."

"Shut up. You don't know anything about them," he murmured past the lump in his throat.

The words continue, falling in line as neat as the ants marching across the table, carrying away bits of meat and gristle. "You need them. They make you feel human. They don't need you. They've never needed you. You've just let them think they do."

And the worst thing is that he isn't sure if that's a lie or another ugly truth he'd buried.

-ooo-

"Lancia, I'm going to send you away for a while," Matteo Salvatore commented, settling down with a groan on the steps beside him.

"What?" He replied, surprised by both his sudden appearance and the words, his stomach dropping. It wasn't as if he hadn't been sent away on business before, but it had never been for anything more than a day or two. Just long enough to knock people back into line.

"We've decided to expand into America. Nothing too dramatic, we aren't trying to grow the family into something unwieldy, after all, but our contacts there have been a bit flakey lately so I've decided we need a small contingent there to help smooth the waters for our export business."

He frowned, "And you want me to go along as protection?"

He laughed, his eyes crinkling with amusement, "Oh, good God, no. I want you to head up the operation."

It felt a little like he'd just been punched in the gut, "You want me to what?"

The old man burst out laughing even harder than before and it was several minutes before he'd finally composed himself well enough to speak again.

"Oh, the look on your face, Lancia," he wiped tears from the corners of his eyes, still chuckling a little. "I'm sorry, I should have probably led with that, huh? You always assume I just think of you as nothing but muscle. That's my fault. You just always seemed so much more comfortable taking orders than giving them, but… I've seen the way you've been since we brought Mukuro in. Taking charge of his training, looking after him like you have… I think you're finally ready to take the lead."

Panic churns in his belly, this was… this wasn't supposed to happen.

"I've just-"

The Boss raised a hand to forestall his argument, dismissing it with a wave. "I know you didn't do any of that because you were looking for a promotion. That's why I'm giving it to you. This family will need a strong, even hand to guide it into the future once I'm gone and the others… they're good boys, but they're all too ambitious for their own good. It's my fault, of course, I've spoiled them terribly. My failing, I suppose, is that when I was a boy I had nothing and so I wished to give my family everything, but I suppose there is always an inherent danger in extremes. When you have everything handed to you, it is difficult to except anything less. It's unfortunate, but it is the way of the world. But you are different then my other boys. That's why I want you to take charge of this new project."

"Me? I'm… I'm no good at the business side of things, Boss," he managed with a strained laugh, running a nervous hand back through his hair. "You should probably find someone else to handle things."

He scoffed, patting Lancia's knee encouragingly, "I think you have more talent for it than you give yourself credit for, but if that's you're worry I already planned to send a few people along to advise you until you get the hang of it."

"But I-"

"I'm not gonna take no for an answer, kid. I'm getting old and it's well past time I began planning for the future of this family. And you can't become the head of this Famiglia without experience running some aspect of it. Everyone respects your physical strength, it's about time they learned to respect this as well." He reached out to tap his fingers against the side of Lancia's head with that same broad grin and he dug his fingernails against the concrete, heard it give beneath the pressure of borrowed strength.

"Head…? H-I can't be the head of-" he paused, turning his face away to grasp for composure. Let that bastard think he was overcome with emotion, let him think whatever he liked. It was all he could do to keep from losing his hold, from letting his control slip and just slaughtering the man on the spot.

"What about-" His voice was trembling, gruff with emotion, he had to… he couldn't lose it here. He had to hold it together. He had to just… find an argument that worked, that was all. He had to just… just figure this out. "Mukuro… I don't think he's ready to be on his own yet. He still doesn't get along with the oth-"

"Allow me to worry about the boy. He's not so weak that he needs you trailing after him wringing your hands and hoping he'll learn to play well with others."

"But he-"

His voice and his expression hardened, "He's stronger than you realize and quite capable of standing on his own."

Stop it.

"You can't choose the circumstances of your birth. Sometimes you're just dealt a bad hand, but you can always choose how you play it. That boy will do great things and so will you."

Shut up.

"I have done things I regret, there are many things I would do differently now, but I don't regret the life I have built for myself. Family can be a stone around your throat or a support to prop you up when you are weak."

Stop it.

"Sometimes you must let them go if you wish them to grow."

Stop it.

"He relies on you, adores you, I can see that much just watching you two together."

Shut up.

"As long as he has you by his side, he'll never want for company and he'll never see the use of relying on anyone else."

SHUT UP!

"I know it's difficult, but this is for the best. You'll understand one day, when this family belongs to you."

Right. That. He could use that. That was obvious, so obvious.

"I can't be… I mean, I'm not your-"

"My son? I've adopted you just like I adopted all the others so you've as much right to inherit as any of them. Blood is important, but the families are generally left to their own devices when it comes to the actual choosing. Besides, you've always been my son in every way that matters. You were an earnest boy and you've grown to become a good man, a kind man. All Fathers should be kind. Some day this ring will sit on your finger and the hard calls will be yours to make, but it is my hope that you will always choose to be kind when you can. That's what I want for this family. That's why I wish to put this family's- our family's- fate in your hands."

"All I've ever wanted to be since the day you took me in was you," he whispers them, but they're Lancia's words. The words he would say if he'd allowed him this conversation.

He laughed, long and loud at that, a grin spread wide across his wrinkled face. "Don't be like me, Lancia. Be better," he clapped a hand down on his shoulder, big and warm as it had always been, but suddenly it seemed frail, the slightest tremble shivering against the fabric of his dress shirt as he used the grip to push to his feet. "Just be yourself, that is more than good enough."

"When?" He managed to force the question past his lips, glad it didn't sound as desperate as he felt.

"We'll start making the preparations in July. If all goes well, you'll be in New York by the end of August. We'll talk more about it once

He watched him go, hands tightening into fists against his knees.

He took the memory with him when he left, leaving Lancia sitting on those sun-warmed steps alone, convinced he'd dozed off for a short while. He wasn't sure why he took it, it would have been harmless enough, he knew he'd played his part well enough, but… there was something in his chest that hurt to hear all those plans for a life that would never be.

He'd already made his decision, his plans were already in place, and all that was left to do was to execute them.

It wouldn't matter if Lancia knew what his future might have been.

Wouldn't matter even one little bit.

It wouldn't change anything.

And yet… he still didn't want him to know.

Or maybe he just didn't want to know.

To know how quickly Lancia would have leapt at the chance.

How eager he would have been to leave.

How easy it would have been for him to abandon him.

It wouldn't really matter, of course.

It wouldn't change anything, but he still…

He still didn't want to know.

He fumbled the gun from the box in which he kept it, fingers closing hard around the comfort of the familiar grip.

They would all be dead soon anyway.

-ooo-

"You were talking in your sleep," Chikusa murmured, hand resting against his arm. Mukuro shivered and coughed, blinking slow, bleary eyes, gummy with sleep. He wasn't quite sure how he'd ended up in Chikusa's narrow hospital bed only that it was warm and he was cold.

He was always cold these days.

"Am I still here, Chikusa?" He asked, voice hoarse, his throat felt like he'd swallowed barbwire. "Am I still anywhere?"

Chikusa's gaze was dark and steady, "You're forgetting something important."

"What?"

He opened his mouth to answer and all that emerged was a cloud of dust and a flurry of grey moths, their wings ragged and tattered in the dim light cast down through the holes in the crumbling ceiling.

The infirmary was in ruins around him, the boy beside him long dead.

And so was he.

-ooo-

He awoke panting, choking back a scream, on the floor of the infirmary. His head ached, his tongue felt huge and swollen in his dry mouth, his palm and fingers slick with sweat where they clung to Chikusa's hand.

Where...?

Why…?

Hadn't he been with Ken just moments ago?

Or had that been another dream?

How long had passed?

How much was he missing?

Pathetic.

He yanked his fingers away, pressing the sweaty digits against his t-shirt clad chest in a futile attempt to calm his rampaging heart.

How many days and nights had he woken like this? Clinging to him, to them, so desperately? He remembered vaguely saying things to Ken, cruel things. His dreams had been… bad and they were blending with memory until he wasn't sure which way was up.

Everything hurt, everything was getting worse.

Weak.

He was always so cold now. Like his body was switching on after so long lying dormant and half-dead around him and now it was over-compensating for all those years where everything had been simple and dull.

Before he'd have barely noticed that the floor carried a chill.

Now he was painfully, irrationally aware that the cold concrete under his butt was freezing even through three layers of clothing and a blanket.

He coughed, covering his mouth with the back of his sweaty hand as he struggled out of the blanket and climbed with painstaking slowness to his feet. He could feel the usual numbness in his butt and thighs from so long spent on the hard floor and winced at the pins and needles tingled and pinched in his nerves as his skin scrambled back to life. He moved to check the computer and the monitors for the dying patient in the far bed. The eye was infected, oozing and he wasn't sure what do for it. Some days he cared enough to try. Well, to make an attempt at caring anyway, at correcting the damage he had wrought….

This wasn't one of those days.

His legs still felt strange and unsteady and the dream… memory that had shattered his rest still lingered, echoed in all the hollows of his mind.

Sitting at that table.

On those steps.

New York.

It always came back to New York.

Was that why he had chosen it? Because of some vague fragment of memory of the life Lancia might have lived? It seemed unlikely, but then he'd never been able to come up with a solid reason for the choice.

New York.

He'd made so many mistakes in that place, because of that place. So many poor decisions and overreactions and he had no one to blame but himself for any of it.

All those days spent hiding away in their apartment, trapping himself in another room, another cage, but then he'd always done that, hadn't he? Everywhere they went he made himself a prisoner. For their safety or for his own… the result had been the same.

Had getting trapped that afternoon been his control failing him or some twisted desire to punish himself even further?

That memory was never far from his thoughts, coloring his days and actions and temperament, had always lingered close to the surface, bubbling just beneath though never quite breaking open air, close enough always to scrap unseen against him, shifting the flow of his moods and causing ripples, panic, whenever he felt the reins of control slipping from his fingers. Looking back at those moments, reliving them now, made him feel rough and raw and restless, but it didn't have the same power over him as it once had. He'd spent too long turning them over and over in his mind, looking for the mistake, the flaw in his technique that had allowed such a thing to happen.

He'd spent months convincing himself that it was the loss of control that bothered him the most, that the rest was… incidental. That he didn't care about those things, that he didn't care about those fading memories, those other lives, because they were not him. That he didn't care about the feel of prickly, sticky hay clinging and itchy against his back or the taste of strangers on his lips or that it didn't bother him to think about the life where the only purely physical pleasure he'd ever experienced had come from murder and mayhem or how scared he was that he might be that way as well.

Or that, if anything, it had never been viewing, living, experiencing such things that had been what bothered him most; that it had been awakening from all that with his body a dull, throbbing mess of half-felt sensation. That the remnants of a pleasure he couldn't truly feel or understand had left him damp and sticky, cold and shivering, a stranger, unsettled and uncertain, in his own skin. That he hadn't been ready for that, probably never would be if the queasiness in his stomach were any indication. He hadn't liked how it made him feel, like the world was unsteady beneath his feet, had hated the way it made his skin so strangely sensitive and fragile.

In the moment, there had been only the shock of the event and the desire to be clear of it, to have those sensations washed away, to have the memory of feeling so helpless and powerless and out of control gone. All the rest had just been so much noise and nothing he could begin to process in any objective, meaningful way.

He had been Mukuro Rokudou, after all.

And Mukuro Rokudou not some quivering, frightened, aching child who fell apart because of something so banal as that. So he'd shoved the memory down, down, down and away, the shock and the devastation and the ache of wanting, as deep as it might go, to be ignored and forgotten.

And it had been the wanting that had really been the very worst of it, he realized that now, two years later and two years older and still no wiser than he had ever been.

He was still only himself and the all that had truly changed in that time had been his ability to look at the scene without the offended pride that had clouded his mind at the time. There was still that desire to be normal and the fear of it too, because all those lives within him and the things they'd experienced had been both ordinary and extraordinary by equal measure. Pain and violence and pleasure and hate and love and kindness and cruelty and he knew all those things and none of them. He was made up of all those lives and none of them and in those moments when he'd been trapped and spinning out of control, lost within them, he had forgotten who and what he was now.

Forgotten all about his life.

Forgotten all about Ken and Chikusa and Lancia.

Forgotten all about being Mukuro Rokudou.

It had been as easy to slip into those memories, those lives, as it would have been to fit into a shoe that was just a smidge too small. Even though they hadn't fit quite right, never would, they'd fit well enough that it would have been a long while before he noticed the way they pinched and chafed at his edges, the way they wore him down.

They fit well enough that he had forgotten what it was not to be them.

Forgot that their loves and pains and pleasures were not his own. And that… that was what he hated thinking about the most.

How much he'd missed it when he'd woken up, sick and alone.

Not the… sex. That had been… not that, but the feeling of connection that had come with it.

How much he'd longed for that feeling of belonging to those lives, living those lives, because they were… more.

More than what he had been.

They had been able to feel things, to be… just normal in a way he never would be. Even the horrible ones, even the ones that had died alone and suffering, even the most wretched of those lives had been rich and full in a way his life never would be. He'd never felt the difference between himself and them so acutely as he had in the aftermath sitting beneath the flow of water in that bathtub.

He would never love anyone or anything, wasn't sure he even could.

He would never be able to discover any of those feelings for himself having already lived them vicariously through so many others.

He could never be anything new, never have anything just for himself, untainted by all the rest.

There was nothing that belonged only to him.

That was just his.

And he wanted something like that with a desperation that frightened him.

And it was the one thing he could never have.

He had lain between Chikusa and Ken on that filthy bathroom floor after Ken had pulled him from the tub and he'd hated them for all the things they would have that he never would.

Hated them so much that it hurt to even breathe the same air.

Hated that they would spend months and years discovering each other, treading ever closer until they finally broke through the surface of each other's worlds and fell together, slotting in to fill each other's empty spaces.

He didn't want them in that way, never would, but it still bothered him to think that there would be a time far too soon and never soon enough where he would have no place between them.

That there was nowhere in the world that he belonged but beside them and the same had never been true for them.

That, in the end, they could manage fine without him.

If he were honest it probably was why he'd left them behind when he'd infiltrated Cacciatore all those years ago. For fear that if they found a home there, he would no longer be needed, necessary.

It had been… easier somehow, in New York, to focus his attention on the other aspects. The idea that his body might be getting up to all sorts of mischief while he was unaware and that increasing and persist feeling of paranoia. He had spent weeks dwelling on it, flinching and twitching and feeling vaguely nauseous whenever he woke up, certain always in the first moments of waking that it had happened again.

That he would open his eyes and find himself somewhere else, possibly in bed with someone, living some other life, but it had never happened and he'd been relieved, but the nausea had always lingered, forcing him out of the apartment, which always felt stifling in those moments, onto the rickety metal of their fire escape.

He'd spent hours out there in the middle of night, both before and after that day, legs dangling over the edge, watching the lights and life of the city, enjoying the feel of the night air against his skin.

Sometimes Ken or Chikusa would join him out there, but more often than not he was alone with just that constant creeping sensation of being watched.

He didn't enjoy that feeling, but it had been such a constant in those days, whether he was in the apartment or out of it. Such an undeniable ever-present part of his days that he'd figured he might as well be out there breathing in the life of the city as cooped up within the walls of their apartment.

-ooo-

"I like New York," Ken commented flopping down beside him and causing the entire rusty structure to tremble and shake. The soles of his shoes were red and filthy. He was pretty sure he'd tracked half the dirt in the city across the floors. Ken had always been hopelessly careless when it came to such things.

"Well, that makes one of us," Mukuro laughed, his fingers caught in the latticework grating of the platform on which he sat. He hadn't told them he hated it here sometimes. That he wondered too often why they'd come. What was the point? They were here and they liked it well enough and it wasn't as if there was truly anywhere else he'd rather be. "You had to come all the way out here still covered in blood to tell me that? Go take a bath."

Ken wrinkled his nose, "I let Chikusa have the shower first. I'll get a bath later."

"You'd better or he'll make you sleep on the couch again."

"That's because he's a jerk," Ken sniffed irritably.

"Sure, because anyone reasonable would absolutely let you get blood all over the sheets for the privilege of getting to share a bed with you when you smell like a bloody, overused sweatsock. Clearly he's the jerk in this situation. Besides, by insisting, he's really doing you a favor, you know. Lancia would kill you."

"Lancia thinks I'm great, he wouldn't kill me."

"If he had to buy new sheets for your bed just because you refused to be bothered to take a bath and ended up getting blood all over them? He doesn't like anyone that much. He would have to kill you to serve as a warning to us not to do the same. Dead. Finished. Over. So long, old friend, and you'd have no one to blame but yourself."

Ken thought about this for a long moment, frowning, before making a slow reply. "Well… you wouldn't let him kill me."

Mukuro chuckled, throwing a tiny piece of rock he dug out of Ken's shoe at his cheek, "You reap what you sow, idiot. I can't protect you from your own stupidity."

"You're such an asshole," Ken grumbled, blowing a raspberry at him and swiping irritably at the place on his face where the rock had hit.

He sobered as a sort of companionable silence fell between them. The sounds of city below were distant, but audible… though they were no doubt louder and more pervasive for him. Cars honking, men and boys shouting back and forth to easy other, engines revving and birds squawking. There was music playing somewhere and he could catch snatches of it fading in and out, the tune both familiar and not in the way half-heard music often is.

It wasn't peaceful, not exactly, but it was close.

"You seem… happier today," Ken commented finally, startling him from his thoughts and bringing his attention back to the fire escape and the bloodstained boy at his side.

"Do I? I can't imagine why," he replied easily, opening his eyes and staring up into the cloudy evening sky.

The days were long and the nights short would probably seem so even as the summer faded info fall since he spent and would continue to spend most of those days alone.

When had he grown to crave their presence?

It had seemed so much easier to be without them when they were in prison, a relief, and here… here it was different.

Everything was different.

He was different.

He still wasn't certain if the change was a positive one.

"Like you're seriously a lot less cranky than usual. You didn't even smack me for calling you an asshole. What's going on? Did you slaughter a bus full of nuns while we were out?"

"Why would slaughtering a bus full of nuns make me happy? I'm not the devil, you know. And even if I were… they're nuns. What would be the point? They already spend all day in quiet contemplation anyway. It would make more sense to like, I don't know, send them to an orgy or something. Nuns. Seriously, Ken?"

"Beats me. I don't question your hobbies, I just support them."

Mukuro snorted, stretching, "Speaking of my hobbies… you should really be speaking English, you know."

"Ah, c'mon, you know I suck at it."

"You won't suck less if you don't practice," he slipped realms with a soft grunt of pain and flicked his fingers to draw Ken's attention as he pinned a real illusion chalkboard to the railing. "Read the first sentence."

"How now brown cow? That's… that's not even a sentence, is it? What am I asking the cow? That's just… I don't know, just a bunch of random words. Does that even make any sense?"

"Not really, but it amuses me," Mukuro replied, closing his eyes briefly. He created a phonemic chart on the board in place of the handful of sentences. "Read."

"Ah, come on, not the weird chart thing again."

"Yes, the weird chart thing again. The weird chart thing until you get better and stop pronouncing words like you're reading a dictionary while caught in a spin cycle."

"Chikusa only had to do the stupid chart once."

"Chikusa is extraordinary in many ways."

Ken groaned, rolling his eyes, "Come on, this is seriously like the five hundredth time you've made me do the chart."

"Yeah, well, you're very special too," Mukuro smirked, waggling his fingers at the board. "Begin."

"You just said something mean, didn't you? I don't need to know the stupid language to know you only smile like that when you're being a dick."

"Less whining, more reciting or you're going to be at it all night."

Chikusa slipped out the window onto the balcony with them, hair hanging limp and damp around his face, hat conspicuously absent.

Ken mouthed 'help me' at him in-between sounding out the symbols and words on the chart. Chikusa just shrugged and lay down beside Mukuro instead, long legs dangling off the edge of the platform. "He's never going to get it you know," Chikusa whispered and Mukuro chuckled.

"Oh, he's going to get it eventually even if I have to make him run through this shit in his sleep. Come hell or high water, he's going to learn and he's going to like it."

"Pea, fly, tea, think, cheese… you guys know I can hear you, right? You're both total fucking dicks… see, shall, car…"

"See? That was perfect. If he only put half as much effort into the regular words as he does the curse words he'd be better at speaking the language than both you and Lancia put together," Mukuro commented, tossing another pebble at Ken's face.

He caught it this time and threw it back, but Mukuro managed to slide out of the way so the rock ended up hitting Chikusa in the face instead… at which point the impromptu English lesson quickly devolved into a high-speed game of tag played out across a fire escape that squealed and rattled and whined in protest until Lancia shouted at them to 'knock it the fuck off before you break that damn thing, you fucking idiots, and get inside for dinner'.

-ooo-

"Mukuro?" Chikusa's voice was soft, hesitant and he glanced over at him, stumbling a little, off-balance, and catching himself with a hand against the wall.

What had he been…?

Right, New York.

He'd been thinking about New York.

The nurse who had occupied his bed was gone, leaving only nasty bedding behind that reeked of sickness.

Huh.

"Did I…" He trailed off, not sure if he wanted to ask the question or get an answer.

Things would be more difficult without a body.

He'd need to… do something.

Something….

There was blood all over the floor, splashed liberally across his stolen uniform.

He closed his eyes, opened them again and the blood was gone, but he was standing in a forest.

That forest.

The one outside Esterneo.

He'd been lost there, time and time again.

He could see the pond.

He'd drowned in that pond.

The sun's light had been so bright reflecting off the water, making his eyes tear up.

Problematic.

He closed his eyes, opened them again, felt a twinge of pain as he shifted between realms.

He hadn't meant to do that.

He was in the infirmary again….

No.

Still.

Maybe.

He wasn't sure, he wasn't… he wasn't….

"I should…" He trailed off again, not quite certain how he meant to finish that sentence.

What should he do?

How did he fix this?

What was there to fix?

What did he want?

What did he need?

Was this happening?

Was this now?

Was this then?

Did it matter?

If he was dreaming of the past then he should just do what he'd done and if this were the present he just needed to do… to do….

He blinked down at the clean tiles, glanced up at the man languishing in his hospital bed.

He'd removed the eye to stall the infection, dosed him with a course of antibiotics. He wasn't certain whether it would help or not, or if he even cared if it did, but it would keep him alive a while longer yet.

Huh.

It was funny, wasn't it?

For a moment there he'd thought he'd killed him. He wiped his sweaty palms against his thighs, grateful that the dampness was merely sweat rather than blood for once.

For once?

He remembered waking to find his feet bare and bloody, his nails caked with blood and flesh. He hadn't been able to stop scratching. There had been something beneath the surface, skittering beneath the skin and he'd needed to….

What was it that he needed to do?

The warden's office.

That's right. He'd meant to see… to go… there was something he needed to do there, see there.

Something… important.

Something…

Something….

He stumbled to his feet.

He wasn't sure when he'd sat back down.

But he had to go.

He had to.

Go.

He thought he heard Chikusa call his name as pain crashed through his head and then there was only darkness.

-ooo-

There's a hole.

He was standing in a hole, knee deep in mud as rain poured down over him; rain so cold it made his teeth chatter, his muscles ache.

There was a dead body down there with him, propped up against the wall, listing to the side with the slow determination of gravity claiming its due.

He thought he could hear flies buzzing, feel their wings ticklish against his skin, tissue paper thin.

Of course that was probably just his imagination. In reality there was only the rain and the warm night air against his skin.

He hummed to himself as he turned back to digging.

After all, this grave wasn't going to dig itself and she was already late to the dinner party that was meant to be her alibi. Not that she imagined she would need one, but it paid to be cautious.

She doubted prison life would suit her.

Too many eyes, too many toes.

Revolting.

-ooo-
THEN
DAYS UNTIL EXECUTION: 122
ELSEWHERE/NAMIMORI
February 23, 2003

TSUNAYOSHI

He splashed into the icy water, gasping, each step taking him deeper even as his body wanted nothing more than to flee the biting cold.

Ankle-deep.

Knee-deep.

Hip-deep.

He was in it up to his chest, his breath coming in startled stops and starts, panicked by how terribly, awfully, shockingly cold the water was.

By the time his fingers, already numb and clumsy, closed on dark fabric, he was standing on his tiptoes in the thick, gooey mud, gasping and shivering, the water up to his armpits. "Hey! Can you hear me? Hello!" He called the words, but what came out was distorted garbage that stuttered into the air in a broken voice shoved through chattering teeth.

He had to bounce up, hoping up and down awkwardly on painfully numb toes as he grabbed and shoved at the boy's arm and chest trying to turn him over, to at least get his face out of the water. "Wake up!"

He'd managed to drag him back towards the shore a bit and shove him over onto his back when the boy came to sudden, flailing life and punched him right in the nose with one small, clammy, ice-cold fist.

He was pretty sure he shrieked, releasing his hold on the boy's shirt to slap a hand against his face. Which really just made his nose hurt that much worse.

"Ow, ow, ouch," he yelped, scrambling backwards out of smacking range. "Sorry! I'm sorry! I was just trying to help!"

The boy's flailing limbs had taken him briefly below the surface again before he broke through the rippling, icy water once again emerging closer to the shore. He stumbled towards dryer land, coughing and spitting water without even once bothering to so much as glance in his direction.

He really wasn't certain whether he even knew he was there at all as he watched make his way clumsily out of the pond, trailing behind him like goldfish poop.

He floundered a bit in the thick wall of cattails that bordered the pond on all sides, but he finally managed to press through them past them, his knees hitting muddy ground on the other side hard.

For a moment, Tsunayoshi almost forgot his own discomfort as he watched him bend almost double, gagging and choking as another coughing fit shook him.

"Um," he began hesitantly, taking a cautious step towards him only to find himself pinned in place by a sudden glare. The look was so furious that he was a little surprised it hadn't just killed him on the spot. "Sorry," he murmured, automatically, lifting his hands in surrender and realizing for the first time how small they were.

Small and covered in soggy plasters.

Well, that was… gross.

Soggy plasters and the tiny scars of a thousand different childhood missteps that stood out stark and white and ugly across the surface.

Why did even his subconscious want to embarrass him?

"Are you okay?" He asked finally, wiping his hands against his damp, drooping pajama bottoms as if that might improve them in some way.

"Fine," the boy replied, looking away, clearly uncomfortable, thin arms wrapped tight around his stomach, damp clothes clinging.

They were nice clothes too.

They reminded him of the suits Reborn wore only bigger… though not that much bigger since the kid was probably younger than Fuuta.

"Do you live near here?" He regrets asking the minute the question was out of his mouth as he saw tension stiffen his spine, his eyes widen with something that looked a little too much like fear for comfort.

So he did the sensible thing and panicked.

"Or not, I mean, this is fine. We can just stay here. It's, uh, nice here. There's water and, uh, trees and it's a little cold, but its not so bad. I could, um, try and start a fire or something, I guess," he glanced around frantically, hoping his brain would just conjure something up, but nothing happened and the boy was now staring at him as if he was certain he had brain damage or something. "I… okay, so I don't really know how to do that. Though maybe I do since this is a dream and in dreams you can do things you can't normally do… probably, I guess, I don't know. Um… let me just find some sticks and a couple of rocks or, um, something."

It probably said something significant that he couldn't even dream about himself as a capable, knowledgeable person.

"…I know how," his companion murmured; rubbing hands over his bare arms as he stood, back to looking pretty much anywhere but at him. He wasn't sure whether that was an improvement over the 'you're a moron' look or not.

"Oh! Great! That's great! What can I… um, can I help?"

He nodded, still not looking at him though he seemed a lot calmer then he'd been when he'd mentioned taking him home, which was probably a good thing.

Probably.

"Find some dry grass, some twigs… little ones."

He didn't really understand much about the process or why they needed a shoelace, but soon enough the tip of the stick they were twisting back and forth with the string began to glow a fierce red and the little pile of grass began to smoke. In a few quick, scrabbling moments the other boy had the beginnings of a small, weak fire going.

They huddled near the fragile blaze, sitting close enough to feel the heat against their hands as they took turns feeding in more twigs to help the fire grow into something a little warmer, a little more promising. The ground was cold and they were both still shivering, but it wasn't too bad.

The light cast strange shadows across their knees, longer and darker than he thought they should have been.

He scooted a little closer to the other boy, close enough that there was a rustle of fabric as their sleeves brushed. "Where'd you learn to do that?" He asked cautiously, he was a little scared to break the peaceful quiet that had fallen between them, but curious enough to try.

The boy shrugged, tipping his dark head forward to stare intently down into the flames as if it held the answer to his question, "Just something I picked up along the way, I suppose. You ask a lot of questions."

He didn't really talk like a kid.

It was a little creepy.

But then he was used to kids who seemed way older than their years.

"Sorry, just… sorry, you don't have to answer them if your don't want to."

"Good," the boy replied, scooting a little closer to the fire.

-ooo-

He woke with a start, sweaty and uncomfortable, legs numb and pinned in place. Panic rose fast and sharp and it was only months of living with Reborn, a notoriously light sleeper who tended to shoot first and ask questions never, that had him slapping both hands over his mouth in time to muffle the shriek that crawled up his throat.

Long moments passed, his heart beating loud in his head, before blind terror finally gave way enough for him to remember that he had been sharing his room with Fuuta.

Fuuta who had apparently crawled into bed with him at some point and was currently lying upside down across his legs muttering to himself in his sleep.

He'd offered to let him stay over after they'd gotten home from the snowball fight, freezing and wet, clothes soaked through.

It was funny, kind of, how whenever they stayed over the kids always seemed to end up crawling into his bed.

Annoying too.

Lambo kicked and took up like three times as much space as he should.

Fuuta talked in his sleep pretty much constantly, an ever-present mumble of sound in what he thought was probably a dozen different languages.

I-pin did both and her kicks hurt a lot more.

He'd be glad when they grew out of this kind of stuff.

Kids… had he been dreaming about the kids again?

Probably, it seemed like he'd been dreaming about them a lot these days with all those weird dreams about crying and winter.

Whatever he'd been dreaming about was gone, any lingering fragments of it scattered by the rough awakening.

It was probably just as well, it wasn't like he really needed yet another reason to feel like a useless weirdo.

-ooo-
NOW
DAYS UNTIL EXECUTION: ?
THE GANG
TRADITORE

MUKURO

"Again," she commented from her chair, legs crossed neatly at the ankle, chin held in her hand as she leaned forward to watch him with cold eyes.

His head hurt, but he nodded and began again.

Skeleton first: envision each bone and how it should be placed, where it belonged and how it related and joined with the others.

Internal organs next: heart, liver, lungs, kidneys and all the other odd and ends that made up a living being.

Muscle and sinew after, red streaked with the white of fatty tissue.

Skin next, milk pale, thin, dyed faintly pink by the muscle beneath, veins a tracery of blue, bloating as they fill with blood.

Fur next: black as night covering all that pale, dotted with spots of white like a dozen tiny flowers blooming in the dark.

The lithe body begins to breathe as sweat springs to life across his brow and his head begins to throb in earnest. He can feel blood seeping from his nose, taste it flowing across his lips, as electric impulses that course through the brain, and finally push life into the heart that beats and drives the flow of blood.

Now a command… no, two:

Live.

Run.

The cat darts away, a streak of black against the dark green of the overgrown grass, speeding off towards the tree line. For a moment, just the briefest moment, he thinks this time… this time….

The blast of a shotgun and a spray of red, gloppy bits of muscle and brilliant shards of bone splattered across the grass.

The rage is red, blinding and he reaches out for his scattered creation, wisps of flame deteriorating in the wind, pulling them back together and extrapolating on the theme, making it bigger, stronger, a predator and then the leopard he's created leaps atop the hunter, ripping him open, ravaging the throat until the illusion breaks and the hunter vanishes.

The woman claps, once and then twice and he feels his cheeks flush. "Admirably done, Salvatore."

"Thank you, Miss Noemi."

"Do not thank you me, Salvatore. After all, that was no compliment, no cheap flattery, merely a statement of fact. Being talented is all well and good, but the only way to succeed as an illusionist is to be able to rapidly adapt to changing circumstances. In a duel with another of similar skill, that is what will save your life and grant you victory. You do not have to be the strongest to win, just the most clever."

-ooo-

It was her birthday and the hands on his hips had been gentle… or at least had seemed to be trying to be at any rate.

They'd been too eager for true gentleness, too rough and shaky with want to be anything like careful. Fingers dipped inside, sliding and petting and pressing slow and then fast and then slow again as he were trying to find what would best please her, but too impatient to really take the proper time to gauge her reactions.

She was aware of this and maybe even a little grateful for the attempt, but it was difficult to focus on anything past the itchy, irritating feel of straw poking and prodding at her back through the thin material of her dress. Sweat lay thick on their skin, sticking flesh together until every caress seemed awkward and forced. The barn was warm and humid enough that it felt like she could probably take a bite out of the air if she were so minded, so thick that even breathing was unpleasant and anything more than that was almost unbearable.

She wished she hadn't decided to do this at all.

Or that she'd picked a better spot for it.

Or that he had rather since he'd been the one to push her down into the hay when she'd said yes.

He was obviously frustrated by the lack of reaction as if there was something he expected from her that he wasn't getting, some test she was failing miserably at. She wanted to feel something, but while it wasn't exactly unpleasant, it wasn't what she wanted either.

She whimpered and moaned, even though she felt hollow and cold, but he didn't seem to notice. She shifted uncomfortably and he seemed to take that for encouragement, his movements growing more frantic as he pushed inside her and she felt something pinch, painful and brief, sore as he continued to move, relentless.

She thought of asking him to stop, but it didn't seem worth the trouble. She'd come this far after all.

She winced, biting her lip and staring up at the sturdy rafters high above them, at the little birds that made their home there flitting inside and out again, going about their day completely unperturbed by the people below.

He squeezed her breast and it was as uncomfortable as all the rest, but she allowed it, making a half-hearted noise that seemed to please him well enough.

She let him finish, grunting and muttering sweet words in her ear as she counted the ceiling beams overhead.

There were seventeen.

He came inside her, told her he loved her in a wreaked, guttural voice and she echoed the sentiment, but the words rang hollow as empty as she felt as he drew away, rolling over beside her to complain about the heat and the itchiness of the straw while she pulled her dress back down to cover herself and wondered idly what he'd done with her panties.

Did she love him?

Twenty minutes ago she would have said so, had said so, it was what had made her agree to this is the first place. But now… now she…

This wasn't how she'd imagined it at all.

But she still smiled when he propped himself up and asked if she wanted to get cleaned up and go into town.

If nothing else, she'd at least discovered that she wasn't bad at pretending.

-ooo-

The days have blurred together to the extent that is impossible to tell if he's waking or sleeping. The memories are coming so fast and constant that sometimes it's difficult to remember that he's Mukuro Rokudou at all. And he can feel all the walls he's built crumbling around him and he's tripping over memories that aren't his own, that never should have been, memories from those other lives, missing up with the memories from before.

Like dreams he can't wake from.

He finds himself picking up their habits.

Little things.

Smoking, chewing on his hair, cracking his knuckles, singing… so much singing… his head is full of music he doesn't know, melodies that feel as if they might swallow him whole. A dozen different little tics that come and go as they damn well. His kills are sometimes neat and sometimes sloppy. He spent hours clearing the blood off a cell floor one day. He still isn't sure what he did with the body. Everything is bad and getting worse and the way they look at him sometimes... like they know that any moment, any moment at all he might snap completely.

He's unsure if it's a dream or real, but it's scares him to see them frightened, unsettled by him.

It's no more than he deserves, at one time he'd even thought he wanted that, but... it's been a long, long time since he's wanted them to fear him, to keep their distance. Even in India, when he'd done his level best to push them away, he'd still...

But maybe it was better like this.

He wasn't safe. Not now. Not even for them.

It feels like he's sinking, drowning again and again, unable to escape.

He's not even sure he wants to anymore.

-ooo-
NOW
DAYS UNTIL EXECUTION: 120
THE GANG
ITALY
February 27, 2003

TIMOTEO

Some days were simply longer than others.

He popped another antacid tablet and crunched it between his teeth, staring down at the latest report, reflecting on how strange it was that some news traveled incredibly quickly while other news traveled glacially slow.

He flipped through the papers that CEDEF had sent over, frowning at the contents as much as the fact that it had taken over a month for CEDEF to ferret out the information and send it to him.

There'd been an infiltration at Traditore.

A man who had come seemingly for the express purpose of observing Mario Rossi had managed to infiltrate the prison for who knew how long and, even when he'd been discovered, he'd escaped without anyone even getting a decent look at him. According to the report, no one who'd seen him and lived to tell the tale could see to agree on what he'd actually looked like. He'd also been able to induce five guards to shoot each other on the way out the door all of which led to only one possible conclusion.

Lucia had been correct.

Alonzo Vinciguerra had survived the slaughter at the Esterneo compound.

He could already feel the migraine coming on at the very thought of it. After all, if the family head still lived so did the family itself. Many families could survive the death of a Boss, but no Famiglia had ever died while there was still a Boss or a prospective Boss still alive to nurture it.

He knew Alonzo Vinciguerra was an illusionist and he'd had his suspicions about Mario Rossi, no, Mukuro Rokudou's origins after he'd spoken with Lucia. She hadn't been willing to speak much of herself or most of the Famiglia, but about a few select members, Alonzo Vinciguerra included, she'd been happy to tell him more than enough to identify that man if he ever happened to run across him. She hadn't said he had a son, but then she'd seemed to have a rather strained relationship with the family long before the birth of her own son so it wouldn't be surprising that she would be unaware of it.

He read through the report again, but every aspect was almost purposefully vague and gave him very little real information other than what he'd been able to infer for himself.

It rankled.

The entire situation stank to high heaven.

From the execution order to this intruder and the fact that he had to have known who Mario Rossi was if he were willing to go to all the trouble of infiltrating Traditore in the first place.

If it were Alonzo Vinciguerra then he had to have someone on the inside feeding him information.

But that didn't make any sense either.

Why would he go to all that effort only to walk away empty-handed?

Why would he risk his ruse being discovered, waste all those years, just to catch a glimpse of the boy?

He picked up the phone and dialed Iemitsu's number, unsurprised when he answered on the first ring.

"Nono! Are you done being pissed at me?"

Timoteo chuckled in spite of himself. He'd always been a difficult man to dislike much less stay angry with. "I find that live my life in an almost constant state of irritation as it pertains to you, Iemitsu Sawada. I have news for you regarding the Esterneo situation."

"Oh? Is this about the stabbing? Because I already heard about the stabbing."

Timoteo startled, his fingers stilling against the open file, "What stabbing?"

"Oh, one of those Esterneo kids took a shiv in the gut about a month ago. My informant saw him poison his attacker on the way down with a needle. Pretty gruesome, right?"

"Which one?"

"Huh?"

"Which Esterneo kid was it?"

"Does it really matter whether it was Flotsam or Jetsam?"

He counted to ten slowly and silently and then repeated the mantra that had become a constant for him during the last few years.

It would be a poor decision to punch the leader of C.E.D.E.F in the throat.

No matter how much he deserves it.

Though, in moments like these, it was a decision he was able to abide by primarily because it was a physical impossibility with one of them in Italy and the other in England.

Which was really for the best.

This was, after all, the father of his successor and his friend. Even if he was the most casually callous man he'd ever known. "Yes, Iemitsu, it matters."

"It was a joke, Nono, a joke. Of course it matters. You're really no fun at all anymore," he sighed mournfully. "Anyway it was Kakimoto. I hear the surgery took hours, but he made it through so that's probably a good sign. Tough little bastards, those Esterneo kids, just unbelievable. Did you know that Joshima kid has a healing factor? A healing factor. It's like something out of a freaking comic book. Say what you want about those Esterneo bastards, but they were doing some fantastically weird science in that basement of theirs. So, if you weren't calling about the kid, what were you calling about?"

"That file you sent over about that infiltration of Traditore."

"Oh, that," he replied, clearly disappointed that it was something so comparatively mundane. "Yeah, what we have about it is pretty thin. Probably an illusionist, but I've had Basil digging up information on the Warden and it likes he might have been auctioning the kid off so someone might have been coming around to check out the merchandise. I'll let you know if we find anything concrete."

"Please do," he frowned, flipping the file closed and pushing it aside. "Also, keep in mind as you look into this that there is a reasonable possibility that a survivor of the Esterneo massacre might be the culprit."

"Ooh ho, a lead. What do you know that I don't know, Nono? Does this have to do with your little sojourn to Vendicare a while back? Did you find out something juicy and forget to call me?"

"Now, Iemitsu, don't you think I would have mentioned if there was something I wanted you to know?"

"That sounds like a challenge, Nono."

"Feel free not to take it as one, I don't really need the headache of you poking around in things that don't concern you."

"Ah, but Nono, secrets are my business. You know I can't help pulling a thread when I see one sticking out."

"I know that you pulling threads often leads trouble to our doorstep. Why don't you stop while you're ahead?"

"Nah, this is exciting! I think I'm gonna head on down to Traditore and see if I can't have a word with that little scamp see if he has an idea who might be interested in him besides me."

"Iemitsu…."

"I'll take Basil, we'll make a weekend of it. Just got a couple things to wrap up here and we'll head on over."

"Iemitsu?"

"Yeah, Nono?"

"Please do not use this as an opportunity to harass those children or Lancia Salvatore just for kicks."

"Sorry, you're breaking up. I'm going through a tunnel. What was that you said about harassing people? Nono? This connection is terrible. I'll have to call you back later. Be sure to give Xanxus my love."

Timoteo scowled at the bleeping phone in his hand and hoped it hadn't made things even worse.

-ooo-
NOW
DAYS UNTIL EXECUTION: ?
THE GANG
TRADITORE

MUKURO

"You smell like him, you know?" Ken's voice murmured in his ear, warm and close.

"Hm?" He managed, struggling up from the depths of sleep that still clung to him like tar, reluctant to release him.

Where…?

There were arms wrapped around him, a body tucked tight and too warm against his back. It wasn't completely unpleasant, but it made him feel… anxious. This wasn't right. They weren't… his thoughts were slow, dragging like molasses and he couldn't quite string one to the next. Something… he'd been somewhere else and now he was…

"Chikusa."

The touch, the breath against his neck were strange, unfamiliar, disconcerting and he took a breath to ask him to move back, move away even as he felt hands slipping low across his bare stomach, sliding beneath his shirt.

He tensed, exhaling a hiss of air sharp as a kettle whistle. "What are you doing?"

"You don't want this?" Ken's voice was low, insidious, as utterly unlike him as any sound he'd ever heard. He jerked against the vise-like grip of the arm that was sliding relentlessly down.

"No," he snapped immediately, struggling harder as sharp nails grazed the waist of his pants.

"Really? You're not jealous of them? Of their closeness? Their intimacy? You don't want to know what it feels like to be the focus of that attention? To be the center of their world? Isn't that why you're cruel? Isn't that why you hate them sometimes? Don't you want to know? Want to know how what it's like? To be held, to be wanted, to be touched, to feel?"

"Get off me," he snarled. "You don't know anything about me."

"That's not quite right though, is it? I know everything about you. Everything you love, everything you hate. I know each and every thing you fear. I'll tear you apart piece by piece until there is nothing left if I have to. Because that's what you deserve. That's all you deserve. That's all you've ever deserved. This is your life, all your lives, Mukuro Rokudou. All your fears and regrets. You wanted to know the truth of you, of what made you and here it is. All of it. May you drown in it."

-ooo-

He was dreaming again… still.

Or remembering.

It was so difficult to tell anymore.

He wasn't sure why he even bothered to try.

It seemed like he'd been here a long time, tumbling, spinning from one memory to the next, stuck, unable to find his bearings, to even remember when he was or where he was supposed to be from one moment to the next. Brief moments of lucidity, surfacing for air just long enough to realize with a sickening, sinking feeling that he couldn't get a grip, couldn't escape the flow, had utterly lost his ability to anchor himself to reality.

He was in New York, body betraying him, finding momentary pleasure in memories that left him gross and strange and uncomfortable in the aftermath. His skin too tight and his head stuffed full of regret.

He was on the ship fighting through a violation that felt like barbed hooks pulling taunt beneath the surface of his brain, reeling him in like a fish on a line. Screaming, fighting, clawing and struggling and finally setting everything on fire, burning the house down around him to spite him. To keep them safe from him, because he'd rather be dead than a liability

He was standing in a child's bedroom...

No.

No more lies.

That was….

No more hiding.

He was standing in his bedroom. It had always been his bedroom and his prison and it still was.

He had never left, could never leave, not really.

Even when he was dust he would still be in that room, cowering from all the things he feared.

He'd touched his fingers to those blocks and felt them slice through flesh to the soul beneath, felt the cold slippery slimy violation of another's unwanted presence. Heard his voice. Rejected him utterly and woken up without the faintest notion of what had happened.

He was dying in a pond, pressed beneath the water and unable to escape.

In his bed, on the flannel sheets of his childhood with his father's hands wrapped tight around his throat.

On the cold, unforgiving metal of the examination room table, his heart stopping again and again as he tried to scream and found his voice had deserted him.

He felt his own skin bubble and crisp beneath the heat of the boss' rage.

He bled and bled, child stillborn and gone ahead.

A pain in his chest and he died alone on a bench by the seaside as gulls cried overhead.

Death, again and again, so many different lives all his now even if they hadn't been originally. His pains, his pleasures, and there was no escaping them, no escaping himself either.

He was in India hiding in the dark of his room, trying to rebuild the connections he'd need to provide for them, to keep them safe and it all felt futile.

He was in a desert, warmth against his back and reaching out, reaching…

He was small again, running again, lost in the forest and too tired to keep going.

Small and hurt and sad and all alone in that dark, cold place again.

Snow kissed his cheeks and the back of his neck as he knelt in the mud, his fingers squishing and squelching in the muck. His knees burning with scraps and bruises from the mad dash through the forest and he was so cold, so terribly cold especially where the mud has crept into his socks and the cold, muddy slush had soaked into his pants. He felt sick and Papà's voice was still echoing all around him.

Failure.

Worthless.

Disappointment.

He hated this place.

Hated it.

But he was so tired, so tired and cold and everything hurt and he just… just wanted to go home. Even if he hated it, it was still better than this. Running in circles, lost and alone and freezing in the dark.

Maybe it would be better if he just disappeared, if he could just sink down into the mud, let it swallow him up until there was nothing left. Maybe Papà would be happy if he were just… gone.

Maybe he would be too.

Maybe it would be a relief to just lie down and sleep, let the water the fill his lungs, choke him. Maybe that was what he deserved, maybe….

"It's not your fault," a voice whispered and he startled a little bit at the sound, at the soft voice that should have been his own and wasn't.

Was kind, soft in a way he'd never been and never known… certainly not then, not in the prison his father had built for him.

Then.

Right.

This was a memory. This wasn't… he wasn't… he wasn't this boy anymore. This scared child lost in his own despair.

He had been once, but not anymore.

He was something more now… something different, something worse.

Why was it so difficult to remember that? He could grasp the concept, but it seemed on the verge of slipping away again into the darkness of the abyss.

He wasn't this child and he was.

He wasn't here and he was.

His head felt fuzzy, musty, clogged and overflowing with a thousand different memories, jostling for attention.

He was….

He was….

"Not your fault," the voice commented again this time in bizarre, barely intelligible Italian.

Strange.

He'd been alone here.

He'd always been alone until….

This wasn't any part of this memory or even of any of those other lives that bleated for his attention at the edges of his consciousness. This voice was… a child's voice, soft and kind as nothing had been then and rarely was now. A child's voice and now a child's form, all muddy pajamas and small, rough hands, splashing down before him. Kneeling with him in the icy slush where moments before there had been nothing and no one.

Interloper.

Invader.

He stared hard at those hands, those small hands covered in scratches and plasters, reeking of ointment and a mother's touch.

They looked so terribly ordinary, so utterly benign, that he couldn't quite bring himself to look up, to see what nightmarish face had been paired with them. After all, there had to be a trick here, some fresh hell his mind had cooked up. Instead he just stared harder at the filthy, slushy mess in which they knelt and hoped if he ignored it that it would simply fade away.

These memories were proving to be full enough of monsters without his brain adding new horrors to the mix.

-ooo-
THEN
DAYS UNTIL EXECUTION: 119
ELSEWHERE/NAMIMORI
February 28, 2003

TSUNAYOSHI

He knew this had to be a dream.

After all, he definitely remembered going to sleep in his own bed. He remembered putting on the flannel pajamas he was wearing, which had been plenty warm for sleeping, but weren't really great for wandering around a snowy forest in the dead of winter. He even remembered pulling on the woolen socks that were now frozen and muddy around his numb, stumbling feet.

What he didn't remember was waking up in this place. One minute he'd been lying in bed trying not to think about the history test he was probably going to fail tomorrow or the training regime he was going to be given by Reborn as punishment for it and the next…

The next he'd been stumbling, shivering, through a snow-covered forest in his pajamas looking for… for… something.

He knew it had to be dream, but everything felt… kind of weirdly real. Not too real, because it was bitter cold and he'd been there for a while and he was pretty sure he'd be much worse off if he were really stumbling around in the snow without gloves or shoes or a coat. He wasn't really sure how long it took to get frostbite, but it felt like he'd probably already lost a couple toes if this were real. He was cold and it kind of sucked, but it could have been worse. Mostly he was just eager to find…

Why couldn't he remember what he was looking for anyway?

He knew there was something that he needed to find, but try as he might he couldn't seem to remember what it was or why he needed to find it so badly. There was just this feeling, almost like panic, beating in time with his heart like he needed to hurry, because if he didn't hurry something bad was going to happen.

He shivered, folding his slim arms over his chest and exhaled sharply, his breath streaming out as white smoke as he quickened his pace. It was somewhere close by, he knew it was; he could feel it, if he could just… just….

Oh.

"You," he whispered, his breath shuddering out as he stumbled to a stop, his heart in his throat. "I'm here for you."

He'd trudged around a particularly large tree and the boy had just been there, small and thin and soaking wet, kneeling in the middle of a big well-trodden slushy mud puddle, his dark hair hanging around his face like a veil. His clothes were dark and too light for the weather like he'd left in summer and stumbled into winter. His backpack was red, too bright and new like it had never been used before, stuffed full to bursting and streaked with mud and dyed dark with damp. His jeans and t-shirt were dripping wet and his pale skin was a wash of red and purple and pale, ice forming in his hair and across his shoulders as snow settled there.

He wasn't crying, at least Tsunayoshi didn't think he was, but there was still something terribly sad about him. He was mumbling to himself, words that sounded like gibberish, too fast and strange and the closer Tsunayoshi stepped the better he could hear it and the less sense it made until…

Papà.

It wasn't said exactly the same way it was in Japanese, but it was close enough that he could recognize it and what it meant. It wasn't like it was the first time he'd heard the word after all and once he realized where he'd heard it the rest of the words became more familiar… even if he still didn't really understand much of what he was actually saying.

Italian.

The boy was speaking Italian.

He'd heard Reborn speak it a few times, but mostly Reborn had always made a point of sticking to Japanese… probably for his benefit. Mainly what he'd heard of it had been caught in bits and pieces from Lambo and Dino and Bianchi and Fuuta, sometimes Gokudera.

The boy was still speaking, soft and panicked and obviously upset, sitting in the mud like he didn't notice the cold or didn't care about it. He didn't even seem to notice Tsunayoshi standing over him and he found himself wondering if the boy could even see him. If this was the sort of dream where he'd try to help and be completely ignored or not be able to touch or speak or reach the person he was trying to get to.

He'd had dreams like that about his Dad once or twice after he'd left that last time. Of him drowning, struggling, flailing and disappearing down beneath the surface of a pit of black, greasy oil. He remembered calling for him, trying to get to him, splashing around wildly in the muck, reaching and always failing. Failing miserably and sometimes even falling in and flailing about uselessly until he ended up drowning in the pit himself and, every now and again, he'd feel his father's hand around his ankle, yanking him down into the dark as the bitter taste of oil filled his mouth. Every time he'd wake up frantic, feeling around the bed like it would make some difference and when he finally realized it had just been a dream, he'd muffle his sobs and stupid, pointless tears against his pillow so Mom wouldn't hear.

The dreams had stopped after a while, but the feeling that Dad being gone was somehow his fault never really had.

"It's not your fault," he commented, the words tumbling out of his mouth in Japanese before he'd even considered what he was saying or why. The boy fell instantly silent, frozen unnaturally still by his interruption, but he still didn't look at him at all. "Um, sorry, right, Italian, um," he bit his lip trying to remember how you said that in Italian.

He strained to remember something, anything that might help, but he hadn't ever really paid much attention when the others were speaking Italian. There'd just never seemed much point. He wasn't any good at Japanese even and he was failing English miserably so Italian was probably way beyond him. He'd felt stupid even asking Gokudera or Fuuta or Dino what a particular word meant, forget about asking Reborn or Bianchi who'd both have probably looked at him like he was some sort of idiot… which wouldn't have been that different than usual really, but still. So, his understanding of Italian was limited to maybe half a dozen words and he wasn't confident in his ability to make anything even vaguely coherent out of them. Still, he couldn't just… just not try when the kid was obviously really upset and probably scared and he… he had to try at least.

"Non culpa," he offered, stumbling over the words and flushing hot with embarrassment at the knowledge that that wasn't even anything close to a sentence or even a coherent idea. He was so stupid. Why was he even trying? He sucked. He slumped to the ground in front of him in the cold, gross icy mud in which he knelt. "Non culpa," he repeated again, miserably before trying again in Japanese. "Whatever… whatever happened. It's not your fault."

The boy still didn't look at him at all, but he could tell by the way he was holding his breath that he'd heard him, that he knew he was there, even if he refused to look at him. He seemed a little scared. It was probably super weird having some foreign guy yabbering away at you.

"I'm not… I'm not going to hurt you," he volunteered feeling really lame even as the words slipped out. The boy probably didn't speak Japanese and, even if he did, that was just the sort of thing someone who was there to hurt him would probably say so it probably wasn't reassuring at all.

He was so bad at this.

Why was he even here? Why had he even bothered? Why had he thought he could…?

He felt really stupid.

It used to be really tough to even think about reaching out, trying to help people, because he'd been so certain of rejection. Now it was… still really hard, but... sometimes, sometimes it seemed like it was more important to try than it was to play it safe. He was getting a little better at it. At not letting his fear keep him from doing the things he thought he needed to, but he still couldn't seem to help always felt really embarrassed because he knew he was really, really bad at it.

He'd probably always feel this way.

He reached forward slowly, carefully, and he noticed his hands were small, tanned and scrapped, covered in bandages the way they'd often been when he was little. Back when Dad was still coming around, when he'd first begun to realize that he wasn't just a little clumsy, a little slower than the other kids, when he began to suspect that he was just… less. When his Dad had started really shoving him at sports and things in the desperate hope of finding something he was good at and yanking him back out of them when he realized he had no talent for, well, anything really.

Dad had been kind of a jerk.

"Dads just suck sometimes," he murmured, pressing his hands into the mud, touching his fingers against the back of the hands buried beneath the surface. He wasn't sure why he said it or whether it was his words or the touch of his hands that made the boy startle, made him inhale sharply and finally glance up at him with eyes that were so blue they almost seemed to glow in his pale, blotchy face. He was really young, but his eyes seemed… different. Weird. It sent a shiver up his spine, something between fear and uncertainty and excitement.

It was really… weird.

Whatever it was, he kept speaking, his voice shaking a little though he wasn't sure why, "Um, hey, uh, hi, I'm, um, it's gonna be okay."

"Y-y-you're not supposed to be here," the boy replied in quiet Japanese, his voice soft as the breeze that rustled the leaves in the trees and ruffled his hair. "I've never… I'm not… You don't belong here."

"Sorry," he replied, unsure what else to say. "I can, um, go? If you want?"

The boy looked down and away, the slightest lift of his shoulders the only indication he'd heard the offer. He wasn't really telling him to stay, but it wasn't asking him to go either. For lack of anything else to do, he slipped his hands deeper into the puddle so that he could find and grip the boy's hands in his. They're thin and cold and buried in the mud which was kind of gross and cold and squishy and the way the boy frowned didn't exactly fill him with confidence that it was the right thing to do, but he didn't jerk away from him so that was something at least.

His stomach squirmed, nervous and unsettled, "You don't belong here either," he said eventually, more to fill the uncomfortable silence than because he'd really thought it out. "This seems like a really bad place."

And it did. There was something about it, something besides the cold and the damp, that made it feel… bad, spoiled, like the whole place had gone rotten somehow.

"I-it is," the boy agreed, voice still soft, distracted. "I hate it here, but there's no where else to go. Just round and round and I always end up back here and I can't stop wondering if maybe I never left. Maybe I've always been here and everything else is j-just… what if I dreamed them up? What if they aren't real? What if it's just me? What if it's always been just me?"

There was a kind of soft horror in the boy's voice and Tsuna remembers all the times he wondered the same thing about Reborn, about every strange and improbable thing that had happened to him since Reborn had shown up at his door and bullied his way into his life.

"You're definitely not alone."

"What?" The boy asked, blinking up at him as if he'd forgotten he was there.

"I was alone for a really long time and then everything changed for me. Everything changed and I was… I had people I could count on, who were… important to me and a lot of times I think I'm gonna wake up and it's all going to be gone, that they'll realize I'm a loser and leave me behind, but… but I'm trying to believe in them and myself too. You should believe in your friends. I'm sure they're waiting for you."

"W-what do you know about it?"

"I know that you wouldn't be so worried about losing them if you didn't care about them. So you should believe they're there waiting for you to come back."

"You have no idea what you're talking about."

He laughed because it was probably true. He wasn't even sure why he'd said it except that it… it just seemed like that was how things were. And he realized even as he thought it that it sounded stupid and ridiculous and it was absolutely something he'd never, ever admit out loud. "Uh, yeah, but you still want to go home to them, right?"

"And what if I do? I don't even know the way anymore. I messed up," the boy admitted, flinching a little like the confession hurt. He was really small, they both were, but he seemed… older somehow. It was in his eyes and the way he talked. Like he was someone really different than he appeared to be. "I ruin everyone I touch."

The boy's fingers trembled, shifted and clutched at his own as if he expected Tsunayoshi would yank his hands away at any moment and he couldn't bear it. Somehow that simple movement quieted the unease he'd been feeling. Made it easier to stay, to grip his hands just as hard in return.

"It feels like I've been wandering for years and years and I've lost the script somewhere along the way," he confessed, gaze focused down and away. "Now and then are all mixed up and I can't even tell what's a dream and what's real anymore. Everything is so loud and I-I don't… don't… don't know why I'm telling you this." The boy shook his head sharply, his grip painfully tight as he raised his gaze, suddenly razor-sharp with intent. "Who are you? Why are you here?"

"I'm…" He began, unsure how to finish. They were just… strangers and he wasn't sure why he was here, just that he wanted to… to do something for him. "I want to help you," He finished lamely, feeling worse when the boy shot him a withering glare like he suspected he was slow or stupid or….

He was used to looks like that and maybe he had never stopped being bothered by them, but he'd learned to laugh them off at least.

Most of the time.

He wasn't sure why the nervous laugh that stumbled past his lips now felt so much like a sob.

So stupid.

"D-d-do I look like I want help?" The boy's voice was almost conversational and Tsunayoshi winced as nails dug into his palm, hard enough to probably draw blood.

"Y-yeah," Tsuna stuttered, the sudden pain startling honesty from him. "Yeah, you really do."

The boy laughed, sudden, like glass shattering, releasing his hands at the same time, almost casting them away as he stumbled to his feet, as if he couldn't move away fast enough. "Go to hell," he snarled, flinging mud at him that splattered across his face, his pajamas.

And that was when he lost his mind.

Or that's what it felt like anyway, because he'd never sought out a fight in his life without one of Reborn's bullets to nudge him along, but that mud splashed across his neck and chest and he launched himself at the other boy, hitting him from behind hard enough that they both go tumbling, sprawling in the mud.

The boy snarls something that might be a curse and turns and then they're both scrambling at each other, trying to escape, trying to gain the upper hand, he isn't sure. He flails at him with tiny fists, kicking and punching, fingers catching in the long dark damp of his hair. The other boy is better than he is, meaner, and he fights dirty, biting and clawing and twisting around and around until Tsunayoshi ends up pinned to the ground, their hands locked together as the boy kneels on his chest, knees digging in, the painful weight of him making it difficult to breathe. He glares down at him, his blue eyes wide and bright, almost feverish, his grin triumphant.

He looks alive and focused and wild and smug.

Found you.

Which is a stupid thought, but he can't help thinking that this… this is how he's supposed to be and all the panic and confusion was just something he'd gotten tangled up in for a while.

He doesn't even really mind that the mud is oozing down the back of his pajamas or that the water is freezing or that his hair feels thick and sticky and gross.

It was worth it.

And the smile on his lips feels weird and bright and so large that it seems like it might crack his face in half. "Guess you can't be that lost if I could find you."

"Maybe you're just really unlucky," the boy replied, releasing his hands with a rude scoffing noise and crawling backwards to sit beside him. He ran a hand back through his hair, wincing when it came away muddy and flicking more mud at Tsunayoshi's face as he sat back on his heels. "I'm not the sort of person people search for. I'm the sort of person people with any sense at all run away from."

"You don't seem so bad to me," Tsunayoshi laughed, sitting up and wiping the mud off his face though since his hands were plenty filthy too he probably just made it worse.

The boy scowled at him, "Are you stupid or do you just have no sense of self-preservation at all?"

Tsunayoshi felt his cheeks grow hot and wiggled his toes, cold and uncomfortable in his wet, slimy socks. "Both, probably," he murmured, running a hand back through his hair. "I really suck at this, huh?"

"You're not the only one," the boy commented and Tsunayoshi glanced up at him, startled, to find him studying the ground intently, his lips a tight line. "What is it you want? In return for this?"

"For what?" Tsunayoshi asked, a little confused. He hadn't really done anything much… and definitely not anything that deserved something in return.

"For helping me," he replied, voice flat and reluctant.

"Oh, um, did I…? Help you, I mean? Because I was thinking I probably owed you an apology for tackling you like that. I don't… I don't usually do stuff like that."

"It was reasonably effective," the boy replied, his words so at odds with his appearance that it made him smile again. "I'm not having such a difficult time remembering that this isn't... that I'm not…" He trailed off, looking down at his hands and breathing out a sigh. "It doesn't matter."

"Oh, um, okay, well, if you say so… I'm glad I could help, I guess."

"Why did you come here?"

"Oh, I…" Tsunayoshi frowned, voice dropping to a mumble, because it was embarrassing. He turned his gaze down to the mud, working his fingers back beneath the surface, fidgeting uncomfortably with it just for something to do. "I don't really know. I mean, I think I just came for you."

"That can't be right," the boy replied quickly and he could hear the frown in the voice. "I'm not the sort of person people search for. I'm the sort of person people with any sense at all run away from."

Tsunayoshi glanced back up, smile tugging at his lips at how serious the boy sounded when he said that. It was easy not to be mortified when someone took what you said so seriously. "Well, no one's ever accused me of having good sense. Besides, you don't seem scary to me," he commented, the words were out of his mouth before he'd even really considered them.

The boy glanced up at him, meeting his gaze, blue eyes wide with surprise. Something about that look made him feel embarrassed and he could feel his entire face heating as he looked away again, running a nervous hand through his hair and letting out a flustered squawk as he accidently slapped what felt like a bucket of mud down against the damp strands.

It dripped over his ears and down over his forehead as he wiped frantically at it in the hopes of keeping it out of his eyes, "Ah, c'mon, gross. Why? Why do I do stuff like this? Why?"

Then there was a soft cough followed by another and another and he glanced up to find his shoulders shaking as he tried, half-heartedly, to muffle laughter against the back of his hand.

He snorted, glancing away again, a smile tugging at his lips as he wiped his muddy hand against his pajama pants, "Shut up."

His face felt like it was on fire as the boy finally broke, peals of laughter spilling from his lips to fill the air around them.

It was such a bright, brilliant, unexpected sound that he couldn't bring himself to care that it was at his expense. It was the sort of thing that was worth a little embarrassment.

"You're ridiculous," the boy commented finally, shaking his head, his smile fading along with the laughter.

He looked like he wanted to say more, but whatever it might have been was lost as a terrible rumbling, grinding sound erupted around them as the ground began to swell and shake, to buckle and crumble around them.

The snow, which had been falling lightly all along, fell thicker and heavier between them, blackening at the edges, more ash than snow, but cold and wet and sticky as it fell over them, plastering his already damp, muddy hair down against his head. The whole world seemed to darken around them, the air crackling with a sound like branches breaking. Above it all, soaring through the air and louder than all the rest, there was a man's voice speaking in careful, measured tones. Each word was like a gunshot and he hadn't even realized that he'd reached for him, that he'd caught his hand until the boy's fingers tightened painfully against his own, ragged nails cutting into his palm.

He edged closer to him until their knees were pressed together in the muck. He wasn't sure if the boy even noticed. He was too busy glancing around, nervous, edgy, looking as anxious as Tsunayoshi felt as he tried to keep his eyes on everything in every direction all at once.

It made Tsunayoshi's breath quicken, his heart race panicked in his chest as if there were some terrible danger that he didn't fully understand in those words, in the boy's shuttered expression.

He didn't understand the words, but he…

The voice called again a booming sound like thunder and panic had him using his grip on the boy to yank him up, forward, towards him. They crashed into each other, foreheads bumping painfully, but the pain helped him focus, helped him pull the boy with him as he struggled to his feet, splashing and slipping in the slick mud. "We need to get out of here. C'mon. Let's go!" He had to shout to be heard, but he didn't care.

"Go?" The boy called back, his gaze strange and clouded like he was only half there. He sounded very young again suddenly. "Where? He always finds me."

"Hey," he fell back down beside him and pressed his free hand against the boy's cheek, smearing it was mud and earning himself a half-hearted glare. "I'm not good for much, but I think I can probably manage running and hiding. What's your name?"

"…does it matter?" He muttered, distracted, as he glanced back towards the rustling trees as if he expected someone to burst out of them at any moment.

"Only if you don't want me calling you 'hey you'," Tsunayoshi replied with forced cheer.

The boy's lips quirked, not quite a smile, but close, though he still didn't look away from the trees. His voice when he spoke again was soft and reluctant, "Mario."

Somehow he didn't look like a Mario.

"Okay, Mario, I'm going to take you home. So, let's get out of here." He pushed himself back up out of the sucking, protesting mud and half-dragged the reluctant boy to his feet.

"Home? This is my home," Mario murmured, his gaze darting to him and then glancing off to the side as he shook his head violently, gasping like he was surfacing from some deeper, darker place. He pressed a muddy hand to his head, leaving another dark smear across his pale face. "No, I… I'm not… I'm not…."

"You're not a kid anymore, right?" Again, that look of surprise, but there was no meanness in it this time. He just looked startled. Tsunayoshi smiled, scuffing his free hand through his wet floppy hair. It felt nice to surprise someone, to find the right answer before there was even really a question. To just know something was true. "Me neither, I mean, this is just a dream, right? It's just… just the memory of something bad that happened a long time ago. You have somewhere else to go now, right? People who are waiting for you? You really shouldn't keep them waiting." He was still smiling as he tugged him forward again and found he came easily this time and they stumbled together into the forest on numb, frozen feet.

Deeper and deeper they went, muscles warming until stumbling gave way to walking and finally to running.

Running.

Running on and on through the deepening snow and the slushy mud beneath, dodging around trees and tripping over broken branches, pulling each other up and through over and over again. Through the shadowy forest as the snow blew thick and wet around them, away from the voice and the darkness that still felt like it was pursuing them with the indolence of an overconfident predator.

"I'll get you back to them," Tsunayoshi called back, feeling certain and confident in a way he never did in the waking world. "I promise I'll get you home."

"Y-Y-You're an idiot!" The boy protested, sounding frustrated and kind of flustered, but Tsunayoshi noticed that he wasn't trying to stop or pull away.

"I get that a lot!" He called back as they ran, as he moved through that overgrown forest with a fluidity and grace he'd never had, never would have, but he needed it now, because it felt like if he stopped, if he hesitated, even for a moment, they'd be caught and that would be the end. That Mario would be lost forever to whatever horrible thing was chasing along behind them and he didn't want that. He wanted him safe and whole… even if he was just a stranger.

Even if this was just a weird dream and nothing here meant anything.

He'd made a promise after all and he intended to keep it.

Faster and faster they sprinted through the dense overgrowth and across the uneven ground of the winter forest.

The snow fell more heavily with each passing moment, making it more and more difficult to see as if the world itself were turning against them. Soon enough he was moving almost completely on instinct, flinging them both full-tilt over fallen tree branches and across frozen streams where the ice cracked and shattered beneath his feet.

He ran fast and faster and he realized, as they moved, that at some point his companion had begun to match his pace, that he wasn't dragging him along anymore. That the boy was still gripping his hand so hard it hurt, but they were running together and it brought a huff of breathless laughter bursting from his lips into the air. He was scared, scared that the thing chasing them would catch them, scared that he'd screw up, that he'd lose his way or trip them up, he was scared of failing, but… but he was happy too.

Running like this with someone was… fun.

And the boy, Mario, was laughing too.

It was kind of an odd, breathless, chattering huff of sound like he didn't quite know how or didn't do it very often. It was weird… but it was kind of great too. He turned his head to smile at him and their eyes met through the flurry of snow between them just as they burst free of the forest and the ground disappeared, vanishing between one step and the next and they were over the edge of a cliff, flying out into the air beyond and falling down through a grey fog of snow and sleet and ice.

And as he fell, Tsunayoshi couldn't help but think that he should be terrified, even if this was just a dream, but he just… wasn't.

It should have been scary, really scary, but instead it just felt… kind of amazing. Like flying and fighting, like all those times Reborn had shot him with special bullets that drove him to act on barely realized desires. Amazing and the thrill of it shivered through his veins. And that was scary in a different way. There was a strange light feeling in his stomach and he was still laughing, still smiling as they fell.

The boy's hand was still cold and firm beneath his clutching fingers when pain snapped him awake, shattering the dream moments or hours or days or years later his chin and teeth ached fiercely where Lambo had kicked him and his eyes stung, cheeks damp with tears. He shoved up onto his elbows and glared down at the little cow that had somehow found his way past all Reborn's traps and explosives and into his bed for the fourth night in a row.

Lambo snuffled, grumbling, tiny foot kicking out again as he giggled in his sleep and mumbled something about candy.

It wasn't cute.

It wasn't.

Tsunayoshi sighed, gently shoving Lambo aside and grabbing the spare pillow he'd started keeping under his bed for just such occasions, wedging it between them so Lambo wouldn't migrate into his space while he was gone. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't, but it was still better than nothing. Lambo snorted in his sleep and gave the pillow a good kick before mumbling something that sounded suspiciously like 'and now all the watermelon belongs to Lambo'.

He rolled his eyes, extracted himself from the bed and began the long, awkward journey over and around the trip wires and traps to the bathroom.

When he finally reached the bathroom he closed the door with a snap and stood there for long moments in the dark, his hand hovering over the switch as he stared at his darkened reflection in dim moonlight streaming in through the window. The idea of turning on the light made him weirdly nervous, like maybe he'd be able to see something in his reflection that hadn't been there when he went to bed.

Which was dumb, obviously.

It had only been a dream, after all.

That feeling of running, that strange surety that he knew exactly what he was doing, where he was going and how to get there, that he would succeed no matter what.

It hadn't been real.

He'd only ever felt like that in those brief moments after Reborn shot him, when he shed his usual insecure self like a snake shedding skin. When all his doubts fell away and there was only that certainty, that single-minded determination, that inescapable need to reach a goal and the confidence that he would be able to do it… no matter what obstacles stood in his way.

It was scary.

It had been so scary at first, but… at some point… he'd started to like it. To like that feeling of being so much… more than he actually was. It was embarrassing, really embarrassing, but it… sometimes it felt really good too. Like he was someone else, some better version of himself that he could maybe be again if he could just… just get out of his own way.

And that dream had been like that, had felt good like that, only it had been him, all him. His own determination, his own confidence and certainty and desire to save him.

Him?

He remembered that cold, snowy forest. He remembered blue eyes and dark hair and a cold, muddy hand wrapped in his. A boy who wasn't a boy, who had called him an idiot and for once it hadn't felt like an insult. He remembered running and falling and laughing and loving every minute of it even though he'd been scared of being caught, even though every moment felt dangerous. It had felt so….

Sometimes he wondered what Reborn was turning him into.

More often he wondered if he'd been this person all along and it had just taken all that he'd experienced since Reborn had shown up in his life to start to see it.

He wasn't sure which would scare him more, but he knew that there were a lot of reasons he didn't want to be involved with the mafia and a lot of them had to do with the way these things made him feel.

He took a deep breath and clicked on the light.

His reflection looked just the same as it always had: awkward body, unruly hair and too big eyes. Nothing had changed, nothing was different or interesting or special: just the same old loser in flannel pajamas with a drying crust of drool on his cheek. He ran the tap and splashed cold water on his face, rubbing the evidence of drool away with the back of his hand, gaze dropping to the countertop as he huffed out a sigh.

He wasn't sure why he felt disappointed.

It had just been a dream.

He wasn't sure what he'd expected to change.