Okay I have no idea what's happening my updating schedule is like a hellscape but I'll try my best to start updating more often/more regularly. Maybe. There's no promise.

Warning : Blood and surgery mention. If ever you are too uncomfortable I can mark it out; just send me a message.

Chapter 4 - Candidate

Harry could feel that he had forgotten something incredibly important. It was just there, the memory that needed to resurface for him to recall whatever reason for his unease. However, it was extremely difficult for him to care of such worries when Lambo was hanging onto him, begging with his beautiful and tear-filled eyes for yet another round of Hide n' Seek with I-Pin and Fuuta. Miraculously, Harry had been able to refuse him, much to his own dismay and Lambo's disappointment. Harry had to do something before his heart would break, especially when Lambo rapidly wiped a tear clinging on his eyelashes, while happiness slowly leaked away from I-Pin's face to be replaced with a tiny frown of discontent. Fuuta was saddened as well, but he held it in and nodded politely. What a good kid.

Harry was defeated. He was unusually weak against children, especially his son and his boy's friends.

"Alright, I'll talk to the Boss for a bit and we'll see if the chef can spare us some ice cream to enjoy after lunch, alright kids?" he conceded. The three children cheered (more like two children and a teen. Fuuta would have his head if he knew that Harry still called him a kid).

He walked them back inside the mansion, thankful to be out of the awful heat of Italia. He still had was very uncomfortably warm, even inside, and the sun and heat of such a country would oftentimes irritate his skin and make him feel like death had warmed over. Moreover, it was midday; the sun was shining directly on top of the mansion. Thankfully, there was about two stories-worth of reinforced cement.

Harry left the three of them back in the kitchen with chef Maria. She was used to the children and was quite trustworthy. And also exceptionally skilled with knives. She loved her meat cleavers the most out of all her collection. They were not particularly sharp, exactly like normal cleavers, but the force behind her blows was incredible. Harry had seen her chop through meat, bones and cartilage in a single strike. He liked her. And her well sculpted arms and hands. She could probably strangle him with her thumb and pinkie if she wanted. That was a weird thought.

The trip to Tsuna's office was thankfully uneventful. The Vongola Decimo had seen fit to inform him of the Professor presence within the compound three days ago, but they did not find the time to properly discuss of what would happen to the man. Currently, all Harry knew of was that the Vongola Mist Guardian, a lovely lady named Chrome -it was such a cool name!- had been assigned to the job of 'interrogating' the Professor. The thought made him shudder in horror. The Owl of Vongola was rumoured to have driven many a great Mafiosi to madness. But they were also rumoured to have several heads and could commune with spirits of other galaxies. Harry doubted the first but not the latter. And he knew Fuuta. Who regularly talked to the Ranking Planet. Ghosts would not be surprising.

Harry firmly knocked twice on the door, waiting patiently for Tsuna's answer. He knew that the young man was a terribly busy person, who also happened to hate it when paperwork piled up. Additionally, those piles of documents were confidential, deadly, or both. Harry had no wish to deal with a letter that would burn him down if he even brushed against it. The laundrypersons were always talking about poor mailman Rocky. RIP him.

A harried "come in" allowed him to step into the office, which was unusually spotless for once. No trace of any kind of late work, half drank coffee cups or rumpled suit jackets lying around. Tsuna had been waiting for him.

Tsuna offered him a seat, which he took gratefully. He had been playing with the children all morning, so he was feeling a bit tired. He was truly out of shape. Maybe he could ask Tsuna if he could start up a training regime. The Boss was usually the one who talked to the medical team assigned to Harry about his okays and those not. After years of captivity, his body had suffered, and Tsuna was kind enough to take care of him.

"Harry-san, it came to me during our last chat that you're not yet schooled properly. From our previous conversations, Hayato and I have gathered that you have not yet finished primary school when you were... Taken away, didn't you?" Tsuna was right. Harry had not been able to complete any kind of formal education during all his years lost at the hands of the Professor.

He felt blood rush to his face, and nodded meekly. He used to love learning, even if his cousin made it difficult for him to show all his potential at school. He had the vaguest memories of his family before all of this started, most of them were his cousin making his life as hard as he could in all of his spoilt child's glory, and jeers and taunts that tainted the few memories he had of England. He did not even remember their faces.

He had learnt Italian when he and Lambo were still living in the streets by listening to the locals talk. He had to or he would probably have been separated from his little guy, and he would kill everyone who would stand in his path before allowing that to happen. He was really a ruthless beast when it came to Lambo.

"We doubted that. As it is, if ever Reborn learns that you are not yet completely schooled before he comes back home, he'll have my hide, and yours," Tsuna confided. "Also, I'm certain that you would like to resume your education, wouldn't you?"

"Of course!" Harry exclaimed. It was a perfect opportunity. It could finally allow him to write proper reports instead of having someone write down what he was saying, and he would avoid further embarrassment from being unable to write and express himself properly. His Italian was okay at best and he had lost touch with his native tongue, English. Plus he would have the chance to learn sciences and maths and arts and other things that the Professor had taken away from him.

Tsuna still looked somewhat uncomfortable. Which also made Harry awkward. the silence was lead between them and Harry was hesitant to breach, although he eventually did as he could no longer bear the lack of sound.

"Is there something bothering you, Tsuna?" Harry asked him tentatively.

Tsuna jumped slightly at his words. Slowly, Tsuna lifted his gaze from the floor to look directly at Harry. The latter had noticed that the Decimo had been avoiding his eyes ever since they started talking. That was incredibly bizarre coming from Tsuna, especially since he was an incredibly sincere person - which was most surprising for the ruler of a Mafia empire.

"I am to ask you a question that you may find intrusive, but my medical team have informed that it is relevant to your health," Tsuna stated. Harry's blood ran cold. Medics?

He stuttered a shaky 'yes', breathing in deeply to calm himself down. He knew that he needed glasses, as he had been struggling to see correctly ever since before he came to the Mansion, but he did not find it fit to tell his benefactor of this. His knees and right wrist were also giving him some problems, but he knew that he had broken them at least once before.

"Do you know about the state of the womb you were implanted?" Tsuna asked. That was not quite Harry was expecting.

He shrugged. He had not really thought about the organ since he had given birth to Lambo. It was complex, he was not even sure of where it was exactly locating inside him. The only thing he knew was how bone marrow had been taken from his spine and the implantation itself, as well as the birthing process. The videos were rather traumatic. Bloody and gory. He was not even sure how he had not been screaming his head off during the C-section.

"Harry... I need a verbal answer. We talked about this. You need to speak back to us."

Harry knew that. He had gone without speaking for so long, so out of his own mind, with the Professor's Flames shutting him down. He would sometimes just sit down somewhere quiet and stop moving, talking or thinking for hours until someone found him and bring a person who could bring him back from his episodes. Currently, he had suffered from them about a dozen of these. They had learnt after the two first times that Harry responded more positively to Lambo and Tsuna, Gokudera was a touch-and-go, but he flipped when Yamamoto was the one to find him. It took a tranquilizer dart delivered by Ryohei - the Sun guardian, who apparently was a decent shoot, as opposed to the Rain guardian - to render him unconscious to prevent him from going into a rampage.

Tsuna could make him respond by asking him simple questions and talking to him as long as he needed. Harry was hesitant to allow Lambo to continue from seeing him when he lost control. The little guy was in tears last time he had to help Harry. Unfortunately, Tsuna had been unavailable as he was travelling to Russia to discuss important matters that was undisclosed to him along with Gokudera.

Harry had been discovered in a hallway in the east wing of the mansion, hidden behind the floor-length curtains, by Lambo. He had no recollection of the actual happenings, but he had passed out as he hid because he had been having trouble breathing properly. He came to himself the following day, cocooned in his blankets and trapped under Lambo, his shirt clutched tightly into the boy's hands. He had not even been able to remove his grip to go to the bathroom and he had thus spent the next half an hour desperately holding back from wetting the bed. Then, as Lambo woke up, he had to negotiate to be allowed to roll off the bed, and basically crawled into the en-suite bathroom to relieve himself. As soon as he finished washing his hands, he was instantly ushered back to bed, where Tsuna was waiting for him with Harry's usual doctor, who inspected him extensively and scheduled an appointment with a psychologist.

Harry cleared his throat to distract himself. He was not always in the right state of mind to fully process his situation sometimes.

"I haven't kept up to date with its state after I came here..." he hesitated.

Tsuna hummed, his eyes moving away from Harry to look down to the few pages that he had taken out during their conversation. They were probably Harry's medical files. "I'll have to set an appointment for you to see a gynecologist, if that's okay with you?"

Harry knew that it was an order posing as a request, but he was aware that Tsuna was looking out for him; Tsuna had promised to look out for both Lambo and Harry while they were under his protection. He nodded his consent nonetheless. He wouldn't say no to help. He had been deprived of that for far too long, and it would be just stupid to refuse.

Soon enough, Tsuna herded him out of his office. Tsuna used the excuse of wanting a snack to sneak away from his leftover paperwork. He led them both to the kitchen, where the Boss waved over the children, who were already talking to Maria about what they wanted for lunch. They were understanding, choosing to eat things quick to prepare. They all got seated at the counter and the chef started on preparing what they wanted.

Lambo asked for a simple plate of mac n' cheese, which prompted the other children to change their minds and choose the same. At least it would lighten the workload off Maria. Harry was still stuck on eating light and more frequent meals, so he settled on a salmon and lettuce grilled sandwich. The taste of fresh fish was the ultimate pleasure for his palate. Tsuna requested the same as him. The Boss started up a conversation with Fuuta, something about rain and the Ranking Planet.

As promised, when they finished, Harry asked for the ice cream, fully prepared to face the glare they were expecting from Maria.

Instead, she smirked, moving her hand towards his head. For a second, Harry had the thought that she would snap his head off his shoulders. He was mistaken; she simply ruffled his hair, making it stick up slightly. Its length did not allow more movement, for which he was grateful. It took so long every morning for him to get a respectable hairstyle.

Maria give him a tiny smirk. She knew what she was doing. And she knew that Harry knew that she knew. He also had dreamt of at least once saying these exact words in his life. There was some sort of grammatical satisfaction Harry had never known before.

She moved to the fridge, opening to pull out a tub; turning around to grab enough bowls and spoons for all of them. Harry hummed appreciatively under his breathe. It was very obviously handmade. Maria did not trust any store-bought ice creams, preferring to make them herself. Harry was personally fine with either, but he preferred Maria's. It was also a rare occurrence that Maria had the time and patience to make it.

He savoured each spoonful of the delicious chocolate treat. He surely had deserved it after the day he had. And it was not even yet over. He had a physical therapy session scheduled as soon as he finished his dessert, since his time with the Professor messed with some of his joints, especially his knees. He could not even get instantly healed with the help of Sun Flames as his metabolism was slowly repairing itself for years of abuse and the intake of too much foreign Flames would drive him into a state of frenzy. His body had started rejecting all kinds of Flames since it associated unfamiliar Flames with danger. Thank you Professor.

But that, it was a thought for another day. For now,he only had to enjoy his ice cream with his son, and son's friends, while being protected by the most powerful Famiglia of Italy.

I'm sorry that this one is slightly shorter and took so long to update. The end was finicky, and the start made me wanna cry. But now you have it. Yep.

Also, how about getting me a coffee on Ko-Fi? I'd never say no, since I'm broke AF and I need to start up college again. Yep, so I've enough of whining. I'll see you later (sooner than later hopefully). As always, suggestions and critism is welcome. Just don't burn me too much. I've gotten rusty.