Title: The Scorpion's Den

Author: Shaariin13

Words: 2, 142 (details and A/Ns exclusive)

Prompt: Bianchi's birthday. And I owe Creator-san (from the Facebook page I RP as Bianchi [~~\\Kateikyoushi Hitman Reborn/~~]) a Hayato/Bianchi family fic that's three months overdue haha :P

Fandom: Kateikyoushi! Hitman Reborn

Characters/Pairings: Bianchi, background (barely there, really) 8059/5980 depends on you, Reborn, passing mention of Romeo, and an itty-bitty bit of TYL!RL, but you have to squint really hard cause it was mentioned just once

Rating: T for violence and poisonous family fluff

Warnings: Poison Cooking, a little angst, 'Dera's potty mouth, and Reborn's Arcobaleno sexiness (yes, I worship the Spartan tutor baby), 2nd person point of view, repetition of a certain phrase it made my brain bleed

Summary: "You have no idea what I've been through to keep you safe!" "I do know; I always have. Thank you." Your arms wrap around him and you know that all your efforts were not wasted. A Bianchi backstory. Rated T for violence and poisonous family fluff. A itty-bitty bits of 8059 and RL if you squint super hard.

A/N: This is a fic that I owe Patricia-san for three months. I've finished it by the end of prelims, and now it's the start of our final term this semester and it's only last night that I managed to type it up. Gomen ne, Patricia-san! orz Oh , and for those who were wondering, I'll still continue Low-flying Sparrow; I just have no idea how to get around it ^^" I'd probably be able to finish it by semestral break ehehe m(_ _)m How facedesk inducing. Anyways, here ya go, minna!

Disclaimer: Amano owns all. I'm just playing with her characters and giving them traumatic backstories :P

The Scorpion's Den

You are born Fia Renata Battaglia Bianchi, daughter of Luciano Bianchi with his wife, Belladona. For six years you grow up as the princess of the household, the only heiress to your father's vast riches and its equivalent responsibilities. A few months after you turn six your father brings home a small bundle and stresses that it is your younger brother: silver hair, gray-green eyes and all.

You are young, and so, you don't ask why your mother frowns (she never frowned before; it was always either a fake smile, a tight line or nothing at all) whenever she lays eyes on the little boy, or why they lock themselves in your father's study at night when they think you are sleeping and fight at full volume, never knowing that you can hear them from across the hall.

Four years later and you find out you can cook, albeit it's a far cry from the ones the cook has made. But they were your cookies nonetheless, and thus you proceed to the music room where your little brother, dear Andrea Ignazio Battaglia Bianchi, is practicing a few hours before he plays for your father's friends for the very first time at his tender age of barely four. Later, after those jarring notes, green face and pained expressions from your brother pass, you discover that the food you make is poisonous. That day sure is full of firsts.

Your father makes you feed your brother poison cookies before performances, even against your will. It will be years later when you will thank his ill-intended persistence, because little Andrea develops immunity to most – if not all – poisons to be found on this mortal earth. Of course, that was something you're not supposed to know – not yet, anyways, so you watch, pained, as your fratellino faints as soon as he finishes his piece on the piano and escapes to the clinic being run by that shabby doctor who talks weird.

The very first time you sense danger – you are fourteen – in the person of Romeo d'Angelo, one of your father's underbosses (you grew up in the mafia, conscious of it or not; you just know, you always do). His name fit him appearance-wise: the dashing hero from a tragic love story of old with an angelic face and princely demeanor; soft curly hair, lazy emerald eyes a carefree disposition. Despite his beauty, you can't seem to shake off the feeling of caution – of danger – that surrounds him. You're not sure if you're naturally suspicious or if it's just him.

You approach him, and that is when you discover you were a born seductress; you flirt to get your way. You keep him in your sight; as they say: 'Keep your friends close, your enemies closer' ('… your family closest' you add mentally, whenever you see Romeo eyeing Andrea in a way that makes you nervous).

One day, you hear news of Andrea's poisoning during lunch at his school (it can't possibly be your doing; you are in Spain accompanying your mother as she visits an old friend). The moment you get home, you confront Romeo, who is in the process of poisoning the newly recovered Andrea's squash soup. A struggle ensues: with fists flying and poison cooking zooming everywhere. You dodge a punch aimed at your face and retaliate with a handful of toxic macaroons which land a direct hit. Your foot connects with his stomach and he is winded. You grab the chance and slam a whole cyanide cake in his face (you made that one with special care. The poisonous mushrooms you used were handpicked and their toxins extracted meticulously) which was toxic enough to corrode steel. When asked, you say that he was cheating on you, and no one questions this: he's bedded every single one of the thirty-one maids in the house, even the handful of part-timers. You thank every deity you know that you managed to keep your virginity intact. You aren't sure if you are immune to STDs like you are with poisons and toxins, and you are not willing to test that out.

The day comes that Andrea finds out that the pretty lady with silver hair and silver-jade eyes who visits and plays the piano with him until his third birthday was his mother, and all hell breaks loose. You catch him running away one night. You ask if he has enough money, and when he avoids meeting your eyes, you pull him from his bedroom door to yours.

"Wait here," you whisper, and a few minutes later you come back with a small black bag in one hand and a small jewelry box in the other. You hand him the pouch, explaining as you go.

"There are five silver daggers here, and small phials of poisons of different toxicity," you lead him to your father's study. The moment you pick the door open, you pull him inside. "This is a customized Model 22.22 LR Pistol with a checkered wooden grip, Taurus manufactured," you say as you hand him the gun strapped under the desk. You pry open your father's vault. "I can't leech too much for you or he'll notice; the most I can grab is just around a couple of hundred thousand euros."

You go around the room, handing him things he might use: a durable flip lighter for his dynamites, extra magazines for the gun, an extra set of throwing knives.

You bring him to the door with a "Be careful; I love you, Andrea."

His face darkens. "My name's Hayato." You raise a questioning brow.

"It was supposed to be my name; the name my real mother was going to give me," he answers as he turns his back on you. Without a second glance he stealths off out of the house and out of your life. That night, you swear you will find him again, even if it's the last thing you do.

The morning after, the house is in an uproar. You feel slightly angered by your mother when you notice she was fairly happier than she's ever been the last eight years. Your father becomes more adamant in naming you successor. This is where the greatest hitman, Reborn, comes in: to help you control your Poison Cooking and turn it into a weapon that will instill fear in the hearts of the most ruthless mafiosi.

You are eighteen when you master your power, and you finally get wind of your little brother. He is now Smokin' Bomb Hayato, a hired gun under the Vongola's employ. You are ecstatic, since the Vongola Famiglia is the Ruler of the Underworld, and Reborn works for them, too. You feel proud of his accomplishment.

By that time, you were famous by a different name, too: Poison Scorpion Bianchi.

You resist your father's efforts in naming you the next Battaglia Boss, expressing your desire to be an independent hitman like Hayato, like Reborn, so you go and fly all over the world, tailing after the Sun Arcobaleno, learning the ropes and the tricks of the trade while escaping your inheritance of your father's Family.

You are twenty, and Reborn is tasked by Vongola Ninth to train the last Vongola Decimo Candidate residing in a small prefecture in Japan. You are sad to see your mentor, best friend and father-figure go, but work was work, and before Reborn was your teacher, he is the greatest hitman in the world who works for the strongest Family in the world. So, off he goes.

A week later, you receive a message from the fedora-donning baby: 'Smokin' Bomb is Decimo's future right-hand man.' Your heart soars as you plan on following him, but it crash lands when you realize Hayato might be less than ecstatic in seeing you after six years with no important reason. Reborn gives you one: Pretend to be his psychotic fling who stalks him constantly while testing the Vongola boy along the way. It was a win-win situation; you get to see your brother, and at the same time you are able to help Reborn with his assignment. It's a no brainer that you grab the opportunity with both hands and a load full of gusto. You board the first flight to Japan that same day. Years later, you look back and conclude it was the best decision you made your whole life, second to letting Hayato leave that cursed villa in Italy when he was eight and you fourteen.

The first time you meet Sawada Tsunayoshi, you are genuinely enraged. Really, a useless boy such as he was treating your beloved genius of a little brother as a lackey?! Not to mention he was wasting the time of the lauded (and loaded) mentor. How unsightly! And so, the first few days, you relish the opportunity given to you to stuff his face with arsenic shortcake and your newly discovered cyanide maki. As the days go by, though, you see what Hayato and Reborn found in him: his ever open mind, his gentle spirit, his never judging eyes, his honest intentions and his heart that was as huge and accepting as the great sky. Slowly, you comply and accept the Family (and family) he is willing to give and share to anyone and everyone who needs it.

You honestly do think that it was Romeo who has returned from the dead to fulfill his mission in eradicating your brother you see when Lambo from ten years in the future pops out from the pink smoke that first time. By default you act as the (over)protective sister and attack. The next instances, you are wiser, but nothing wrong comes out of stirring a little trouble, right? It keeps the boredom at bay. Being Reborn's lover in ten years, the teenaged cow boy could use a little exercise.

Months later, your brother, Reborn, and the rest of the Sawada boy's Family vanish one by one. You force yourself to think that they are simply in another one of Reborn's Spartan torturing-err-tutoring sessions, but when the girls, Haru and Kyoko disappear, followed by Hibari Kyouya and Sasagawa Ryohei, you fly into a panic. Something is wrong – horribly wrong – but you stick at home. Someone has to watch over Maman; whoever took the kids might come back, and you were the only person left who can do that.

Days – weeks – later, they pop back from wherever they went, looking a little worse for wear, but better, stronger than ever. You feel as if you would cry when you see Hayato's bruised, happy form (you do, actually; at the comfort of your own room under the blanket of darkness provided by the night).

When the Shimon attack, that idiotic, baseball-playing sushi boy who sticks to Hayato like glue is the first to go down. You see the seething, quiet fury in your little brother's eyes, and in your mind this display confirms what you've known since the first time you laid eyes on the pair: that the Storm and rain look at each other in a way you wouldn't to a friend (but they themselves don't know, and though you want to end their miseries and help, you are hard-pressed by Reborn's One Ton Mallet to hold your tongue and let themselves sort this mess out).

Fast forward to ten years in the future and you and Hayato snap. It is a rare instance, and you don't know how it happened: one moment, you were having your usual brother-sister banter in the common room along with the rest of the Famiglia, the next you are shouting and screaming at each other at the tops of your lungs.

"You have no idea!" you screech. "You have no idea what I've been through just to keep you safe! The restless nights, the guilt of poisoning you on a regular basis for something as petty as entertaining our father's guests, even my first kill! All of those and more, just for you!"

You think you've never cried – never felt as bitter, as horrified, as helpless – as much as you have right this moment and it frightens you; makes you fear that this brittle relationship called 'siblings' you share with him will crumble. You don't know what to do if it does and this scares you more, because since when have you not known something? But, contrary to your expectations, he deflates. He deflates and he sighs and he walks to you to gather you in his arms.

"That's where you're wrong, Aneki," he whispers to your ear. His arms tighten around you and his head falls to your shoulder, nuzzling into your pink mauve hair. "I do know; I always have. Thank you."

Your arms wrap around him, too, and you know – as always, you know – that all your efforts are not wasted.

Finally finished it! Yay! Thanks for reading! Review, please?