Katekyo Hitman Reborn! is a creation of Amano Akira.

This fanfic is written as an entry to the KHR Angst Writing Contest hosted by Dior Crystal-san. This is also the first fanfic in a year that I've made angst as a centrepiece with some BL tossed in between. I know I'll fail, but I hope I won't.

I always believe that somehow, some way, the sky and the earth were alike.

I always believe that, and I always will. No matter how antagonistic the elements representing them were, in essence, I believe them to be alike.

I firmly believe that, when I met Kozato Enma. He's this always beaten-up woobie that no matter how I picture it, was the me from back then. When I didn't know I was the sky.

When I see him, with bandages all over his face and nasty injuries, I am reminded how much the earth is suffering. From the sky.

But the sky also suffered a lot from the earth. So in a sense, he was just taking in the punishment I had been through. I continue believing then that we were really, really alike.

I then approached him. I introduced myself to him as Sawada Tsunayoshi. I didn't know him as the Earth and he not knowing me as the Sky, so it was okay.

We then walked together. After school, whenever Gokudera-kun and Yamamoto-kun weren't with me I walked with him. We walked and walked and walked. Then we would stop. Then look up at the sky. There were stars. So many, many pinpricks bearing holes in the black cloth called darkness.

We would then sit by the edge of the road and admire the sight.

"The sky is always beautiful…" he murmurs as he puts on another extra bandage on his badly-bruised cheek. "Why can't be the earth be beautiful like the sky at night?"

"The earth is already pretty." I smile at him, always surprising him with it. Probably because… he must've never experienced someone beaming at him before. "It has flowers to cover its bare ground."

"In the day, that is." He mumbles, looking down. "Whilst the sky…"

He trails off, because he was lost for words. His feet lost the pavement- right then left- before breaking into a run, with me leading the way. I look ahead, intent on making him see how wrong he is.

We then reach it: the never-changing building of Namimori Middle School. I scout left and right. It surprised me there was no Hibari-san to intervene what I was planning. Every step we took inside I made sure to grip his hand tighter until we reach it.

Our sweaty figures licked the wind.

We were now on the rooftop. Briskly but smoothly, I let Enma reach the edge of the rooftop. I let him look below, at the many lights that shimmered the town in a pale quiescent glow.

"The earth has so much to offer." I say simply as he looks in awe. I know it was stupid and dang obvious it was for me to show him this but I really want to prove to him that the sky and earth are equal.

His faint grin was enough to know he's with me.

There were times I wondered if we were really equal.

"Say," I said to him as my fingers run through the glassy waters of the river. It was a sunny day that time, fit for a picnic. "Why can't the sky hold anything in its vastness? It's so empty… but the earth is so full."

He picks a shrub by the river and absent-mindedly trims the edges with his nails. "Then the earth must fill it, seeing the sky is giving it everything." He doesn't look at me.

But I look at him, and give the warmest smile I could muster.

Like what I'm doing now.

Then he lands another clean, hate-ridden punch at me, filling me with the egoism, vengeance, and full abhorrence that the earth had already been drowning in.

Crack.I feel another rib there. I fall, as my flame begins to fade while he stands and walks to me, his fists ablaze and ready to be set free for more punishment.

I continue giving him my simper as he throws another fist to my face, letting my tooth fly along with it. I crash up- up- up- to the ceiling before I crash down, the debris of the building's cemented ceiling along with it.

But now I see it- the stars.

And his foot before he sends a kick to my broken ribs.

"You were wrong when you said the sky and earth were the same. How can bitter enemies be similar? How can you filthy bloody murderers be comparable with us?"

"Enma ku-" My pleas were turned off with a more hateful kick to my face.

"Conceited bastards!" He screams out as he lashes again, punch after punch and kick after kick followed by a howl of rage and his flame merely burning more than ever. "Killing my family the lot of you-"

But I smile, calmly, decisively and sincerely.

Even as my eyes were half-closed, my face already scarred with bruises, my ribs broken, and several of my bones dislocated. He adds another one when he severely twists my shoulder before using his knee to pummel me and letting me stagger on the ground.

I try to stand, but my legs failed me and they collapsed on the damaged ground. So I smile back.

"STOP- SMIR-KING!" He shouts and uses his leg to add to my body further hurt. "STOP- EF-FING- SMIR-KING!" My back once more felt the hard concrete wall as I flew many feet to it. But I do not. No way will I. He's filling me. When I am full, I'll just return it to him. This blinding hate of his, and the fear deep inside I'll just return it to him.

Then everything fizzes out. I can't make it anymore. My vision is blurred and all I can see was the moonlight and a figure who was steadily towering over me. I smile at him again, as blood-red liquid dribbles to my chin. I must look really less-Tsuna with the bubbling incarnadine, the grotesque visage, and my disproportioned figure used to be called a body. I guess I can't return it now since it already overflowed.

He punches me some more as I receive it all whole-heartedly. He was very close to breaking. Any moment now he'll be giving me the final blow.

"St-op smirking." He says again as he kneels down and I see his eyes looking at me, the blob on his right that was lighting up must be his fist. He raises it up. I close my eyes and give my indecipherable grin.

It then falls and I was unprepared to catch it.

Tears.

They were falling slowly from his eyes into my cheeks, and I could only stare at him.

"Why- why did I believe every word you say?" He sniffs as his tight fist slackens and disappears altogether and all I can do was look- then smile.

I point up- far up- into the evening sky.

"Because you knew I was right." I whisper, and his trickling tears became full splatters.

I always believe that somehow, some way, the sky and the earth were alike. I believe that, and I always will.

He believes it too. He finally believes me.

I smile one last time.

Then everything slips away.