AN: Today on my menu: Sweet sweet crack. I've been terribly unmotivated lately, and been switching rapidly between my bestest buddy Crippling Executive Dysfunction and playing Undertale as a result. I figured I might as well write SOMETHING, which I have been avoiding, due to my unfortunate fixation on long!fics.

Note: No romance, but kinda shippy.

It starts with Lambo.

Reborn wakes up preparing for another day of endless, constant torture – he's still waiting for Tsuna to realize that the abuse lessens in severity as he puts more effort into his tasks, and the fact he still hasn't figured it out is really starting to make the hitman wonder about his student's possible latent masochistic tendencies – and is quietly alarmed to find that Tsuna is not only in his bed, but had somehow escaped the room at some point during the night.

He steps out in the hall, stretches out his senses for Flames, and finds Tsuna's striking, gravitational blaze in the next room over, in the children's room. Reborn follows the signal, thinking that Tsuna must have heard one of them having a nightmare, or just chased Lambo back into his room at night and was tired enough to pass out there.

Surprisingly, Reborn finds Tsuna in Lambo's bed, face buried securely in the child's afro, and arms in a deadlock around him. Lambo seems satisfied with this arrangement, mushing cheerfully into Tsuna's chest. I-pin is standing at the bedside, frowning.

"He just rushed into the room, it was scary," I-pin whispers in Cantonese.

Well that's odd. "What did he look like?"

"Like he wasn't seeing anything."

So nothing to do with Dying Will. Curious now, Reborn jumps up on the bed and delivers a hefty drop kick to Tsuna's skull. It does the job nicely, eliciting a fairly average-volume scream of alarm. Tsuna drops Lambo like he wasn't clutching him for dear life and clutches his head. "Reborn, why?!"

"You need to learn to stay in your own bed," Reborn replies easily.

Tsuna looks around, and Reborn can instantly tell he has no recollection of entering the room. Even more odd.

"Get downstairs. You're running late."

"Alright, alright," Tsuna grumbles, sliding off the bed and padding out in the hall. There doesn't seem to be anything visibly wrong with him, and he's acting completely normal. It's been a year and a half without symptoms, Reborn thinks he can knock off 'sleepwalking' as a possibility. Possession? Nightmare? Instinct? Hyper Intuition? All are equal possibilities. He's just going to have to continue to observe.

-x-

The next victim is marked the moment Tsuna opens the door.

Reborn can see exactly what I-pin meant, this time. Tsuna's body relaxes, his balance wobbles, and his face goes slack. His eyes are completely unmoving, indeed like he's not seeing a thing. Tsuna's eyes are always moving, little flicks that are always reading the situation for some way out, either from fear or procrastination, and the disparity is immediately noticeable. Tsuna is completely gone.

Reborn looks for a trigger next. He was fine until he opened the door, so the most obvious conclusion; Gokudera Hayato, Yamamoto Takeshi, or both. If it's related to what happened to Lambo, Reborn would have to say it's triggered by either high Flame density or just the link of Guardianship. He needs to investigate further.

Reborn tests his hypothesis by shoving Tsuna towards the gate.

The reaction is immediate. Tsuna veers in a barely-lucid attempt to keep balance, swings in the other direction in a motion too graceful to be called a stagger, and pounces like a starving animal through the gate, so quickly the two teens don't even have time to react. Within half a second, Tsuna is firmly and resolutely attached to Gokudera, and he doesn't seem like he's going to let go any time soon.

"T-T-Tenth?" Gokudera squeaks.

"Go...ku...de...ra...kuuun," Tsuna mumbles pleasantly, nuzzling into his chest. "You're sooooo waaaarm..."

"A Shitopi-chan routine?" Yamamoto suggests with a bewildered laugh.

"Sh-Shut up! Uh, Tenth, what exactly, uhm, well, I don't...?"

Reborn jumps onto the wall and smirks. God, this is hilarious. He loves children. "Aren't you happy? You've received the Tenth's special attention. You should be doing the best to keep him cozy for the rest of the day."

Gokudera, who was struggling to fight down a blush, latches onto that like a lifeline. "Uh, yes! I will! I'll keep him warm? Definitely!"

Tsuna rises on his tip-toes so he can lodge his face in the naked skin of the crook of Gokudera's neck, and makes a strange sort of gargling sound. Gokudera lets out a voiceless scream. Yamamoto is rapidly losing his humour in favour of going into that dark place where he is equally likely to burst into hysterical laughter or admit something is wrong. (Reborn is going to have to teach him to do both, someday.)

Tsuna has given up standing entirely at this point, and Gokudera is forced to princess-carry him with the awkward angle he's been pulled into. Tsuna slackens in his arms, save for the steel grip he has around his shoulders, mumbling nonsense and Gokudera's name with a dazed sort of joy. Gokudera looks more and more panicked every second he is forced to experience his boss and leader mushing his face into the bare (and apparently very sensitive) skin of his shoulder.

Then Tsuna passes out.

"Maybe he should take a sick day," Yamamoto suggests, finally deciding on 'something is wrong'.

-x-

Something is wrong, alright. But seeing as it's neither life-threatening nor permanent, Reborn is confident in just thinking it's really, really funny.

Apparently, after emitting more Flames than anyone ought to emit in the fight with the Simon family and Daemon, and then emitting even more flying himself off the island to inform the Vongola ships that the situation was resolved, Tsuna is experiencing an especially rare and bizarre type of whiplash. Shamal tells him that when a Sky surrounds itself with every Flame aspect, it tends to Harmonize with the Flames. Reborn is familiar with this concept; the Harmony of Sky generates a nice, thick backup pool of Flames that makes it absolutely bugnuts impossible to kill any one member of a perfect harmonized septet, a quirk the Strongest Seven had abused greatly before the curse, and one Reborn has been abusing to possibly overzealous degrees while training up Tsuna.

According to Shamal, though, Harmony also means connecting to these Flames, not unlike how Tsuna and Enma's Flames connected to form Oath Flames. It's natural for Skies to draw upon other people's energy, and the Zero Point Breakthrough revision is only an escalation of that inherent trait.

So when Tsuna emitted far too many Flames, he burnt himself out.

And when Tsuna burnt himself out, he instinctively tried to reignite his Flames.

And when he was instinctively reigniting his Flames, he gravitated towards the natural pool of Flames a perfect septet collects.

And he decided to access it by latching onto a Guardian, securing a connection, and passing out for two hours while he recharges like a phone battery.

This is both hilarious and educational, a scenario Reborn never thought he'd ever experience again. He's impressed. Tsuna continues to exceed his expectations even now.

Reborn snaps his phone shut and strolls into Tsuna's bedroom, where Gokudera is valiantly attempting to survive lying on the bed with Tsuna snoring softly into his chest, spread all over him in an unconscious attempt to touch as much of his Storm Guardian as possible. He's about an hour and a half into the process, but it's doubtful he's going to make it beyond that.

"He's attempting to access your Dying Will Flames to supplement his own," Reborn explains like he knew it all along. "The longer you let him stay attached, the better he'll feel when he wakes up."

"S-Seriously?" Gokudera squeaks. "Is he going to be okay? He's not hurt or anything is he?"

Reborn opens his mouth to say Tsuna is going to be fine, but then changes his mind and says "That depends on his Guardians."

"R-Right. I, uhm, won't let him down." With one shaking hand, Gokudera places a firm hand on Tsuna's back. Tsuna lets out a little pleased sound that sends a full-body shiver through Gokudera's form, followed by another hiss of voiceless screaming.

Reborn decides he ought to be doing something in the next half-hour or so. If nothing else, it might be a nice incentive for Tsuna to never throw his Flames around like that again, and if he wants it to be a lesson well-learned, he's got to make the experience as painful for Tsuna as conceivably possible.

-x-

Tsuna wakes with a jolt and a trail of drool running down his chin. He blinks drowsily, trying to understand how he had gotten from the front door to his bedroom. It just seems like a haze of movement, and possibly people.

Then he looks down.

Gokudera stares back up at him, beet-red and sweating a little. Tsuna looks down farther. He is half-straddling Gokudera, with one knee in between Gokudera's thighs, and his arms on either side.

They both take a moment to acknowledge this.

"HIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII! I'M SORRY, GOKUDERA-KUN!"

"IT'S ALRIGHT, TENTH! THIS IS FOR YOUR HEALTH!"

"HOW IS THIS FOR MY HEALTH?"

"IT'S A SHARING OF MUTUAL HEAT!"

"WHAT DOES THAT EVEN MEAN?"

Just then, Yamamoto bursts into the room, grinning. "Is he okay now?"

"I think so," Gokudera grumbles, adjusting his clothes with a slowly escalating blush. Tsuna is plastered against the wall, trembling and very close to fainting again, though if it's from shock, embarrassment, or the blood in his head being suddenly acquainted with gravity, Tsuna isn't sure.

"That's good. I guess it's too late to go to school now, though. You think Kyoko will let us borrow her notes if we say it's a mafia thing?"

"Like it would make a difference with your grades," Gokudera spits.

Tsuna removes himself from the wall.

"Hey, hey, I can get a decent grade if I try! There's just baseball to focus on, you know- well, now there's a lot of stuff to worry about, hahaha..."

Tsuna stares unseeingly at Yamamoto.

"How do you expect to look after the Tenth if you're just messing around? Bastard!"

"It's not like I'm intentionally- uh- er- AHA WOAH-"

Tsuna is sticking his head underneath Yamamoto's shirt.

When a few seconds pass and Yamamoto doesn't move a muscle (or breathe, for that matter), Tsuna also dabbles in nibbling idly at Yamamoto's ribs, causing him to jerk and shiver more violently than Gokudera ever did.

"So, I guess, he's- augh- doing this to me- hnrgh! too?" Yamamoto asks, desperately trying to keep his cool as Tsuna loses all major muscle control and locks his jaw somewhere above Yamamoto's kidneys.

"You have to let him rest! Put him on the bed!" Gokudera shouts, trying to drag the two over.

"I, uh, I think he's- WAHUGH- trying to eat me?"

"Can you move him to your arm or something?"

"I think he locked his jaw!"

"People can't lock their jaws, moron!"

"Well he just did- OW!" Yamamoto yelps when Tsuna slides down and starts biting rather ferociously on his hipbone.

"Make him stop!"

"I'm the one he's trying to eat!"

"Just slide him onto your arm!"

"I'm trying!"

"Try harder!"

"Isn't he supposed to sleep?"

"I don't know! Maybe it's all the Storm Flames!"

"Why does he have Storm Flames now? That's supposed to be your thing!" Yamamoto shoves his fist in between Tsuna's teeth and his now horribly-injured hip, and successfully resets him onto his wrist. Then he lifts Tsuna up carefully and lets him settle along the line of his waist, where he continues nibbling on his arm like a playing cat (complete with the occasional accompanying lick).

He manages to hold the position, and relaxes when it's clear Tsuna isn't going to gnaw the flesh off his bones.

Then he looks at Gokudera and grins.

"He really did absorb a bit of you, didn't he?"

"You want me to put out a cigarette on your eyelids, baseball freak?"

-x-

Yamamoto manages to extract himself from Tsuna's grasp before Tsuna realized what was going on, thankfully, leaving Tsuna blessedly alone on the bed to sleepily swat at his newest trail of drool, and Gokudera free to grudgingly bandage Yamamoto's bruised arm.

"Did he break skin?" Gokudera asks, turning the limb to inspect the pin-prick red speckles of broken blood vessels, trying to see if any of them are actually outside the epidermis.

"Well, you have to suffer to experience the best things, right?" Yamamoto says idly.

Gokudera opens his mouth, closes it, absorbs what he just heard, and viciously punches Yamamoto in the face with his own arm. Seeing as it is his own – completely slack – arm, it doesn't hit very hard, but it sends the appropriate message.

"What was that for?"

"Bad phrasing," Gokudera grunts.

"Why do I taste blood?" Tsuna mumbles from the bed.

-x-

Reborn is only slightly regretful he missed Tsuna trying to eat his own Rain Guardian, but he's definitely looking a little lighter around the edges, and is bright-eyed and bushy-tailed for the rest of the day, in a perfect mood for some impromptu training. (He says he isn't, but as far as Reborn is concerned, 'decent health' means 'perfect mood'.) It almost seems like he's completely recovered, until the very next day, when Sasagawa Ryohei greets him at the school gates and Tsuna abruptly loses consciousness at his feet.

"Your mission for today is to carry him until he wakes up," Reborn blithely announces.

Yamamoto glances at his arm, then gives Ryohei a comforting pat on the shoulder.

Ryohei doesn't seem to need the comfort – in fact, he seems to enjoy the challenge of finding a way to carry Tsuna everywhere. He starts with him on his back, but then realizes this is a little awkward while sitting in a chair, so he decides to set Tsuna gently in his lap and work with his arms under Tsuna's, in a position not unlike a ventriloquist's puppet. Tsuna is completely limp, and ends up slipping in one direction or another nigh-constantly, but it's a decent enough effort.

Then, come break, Aoba sees him.

"What are you doing?" He asks, eyeing the steadily drooling Tsuna slumped over his back.

"An extreme training regimen! I have to carry Sawada everywhere with me! Even schoolwork! Even training! Without fail!" He pumps his fist, and then fumbles when the loss of support makes Tsuna slide down a little on his back.

"You think you can train with your boss weighing you down? Irresponsible and pointless. In the end-"

"You think you can't?"

Aoba's mouth snaps shut.

He pushes up his glasses.

Then he sprints across the school grounds and around the corner.

He's gone for about a minute and a half before he's speeding back, this time with a terrified and confused Enma on his back.

"SASAGAWA RYOHEI! I CHALLENGE YOU TO A PIGGY-BACK RIDING BOXING MATCH!" Aoba yells.

"THAT'S NOT EVEN A THING," Enma screams.

"I accept! I won't hold back! It'll be an extreme match!" Ryohei grins.

Enma leans forward so he can get a better view. "Is that Tsuna-kun? Is he okay?"

"He's taking an extreme nap!" Ryohei says cheerfully.

"Isn't that more of a reason not to do thi- KOYO NOOOOOO-"

-x-

Ryohei wins, on account of the fact Tsuna isn't jerking back and forth and shaking like a frozen chihuahua.

Aoba makes sure Ryohei understands this, repeatedly, with great fervour, and it's a blessing that Ryohei is a good sport. After their battle is resolved, an exhausted Enma stumbles away, and Ryohei picks Tsuna back up and brings him back to class, where students are left to gape and whisper yet again. The teacher asks Ryohei if maybe he wouldn't mind just dumping Tsuna at the infirmary, but Ryohei insists this is training, and he has to see it through.

It is at this point Reborn notes that Tsuna has clearly been unconscious for longer than two hours.

It must have something to do with the Flames he's absorbed. He had clung to Gokudera, but had chewed on Yamamoto, two radically different responses. It might be possible that Tsuna is reacting based on which type of Dying Will Flame he last accessed, meaning the soothing, meditative Rain put him out like elephant tranquilizers.

Now for the joy of seeing what sort of effect Sun Flames have on Tsuna's constant unintentional hunger for his Guardian's untapped energy, and the ultimate result of his arrangements yesterday.

He smiles at his open burner phone, text history still open.

If you want an opportunity to take Tsuna's body, I suggest you come quickly.

After all, if this experience isn't hell for Tsuna, he won't learn.

-x-

"You okay, Tsuna? You're looking a little jumpy," Yamamoto chuckles, giving Tsuna a cheering pat on the back.

"I tried to eat you," Tsuna hisses. "And then I was out cold for the entire school day? I thought I didn't even to school! How long is this going to last? What happens when I have to absorb Chrome's Flames? She's a girl! I can't just sleep on top of her or eat her or have her carry me around like a sack of potatoes! She's a girl!"

"Hey, hey, I'm sure it'll be fine. Besides, it's the weekend now, so you can probably arrange a more peaceful way to go about it!"

"I wonder if this is going to happen to me," Enma mutters under his breath with an air of dread in his voice.

They're walking through the shopping district, mostly hunting for an escape from the Namimori-bound Cloud Guardian and Kyoko-bound Mist Guardian. Chrome is mostly bound to Kyoko because they asked Kyoko really politely to hang out with her while Tsuna recovers from his debilitating urge to plaster himself onto people. After some needling, they eventually decided to put Adelheid and Haru on guard duty to make doubly sure that Tsuna doesn't break into her house to lodge himself firmly in Chrome's abdomen or something. They have no idea what Sun Flames are going to do to him.

"Why don't we go get something to eat? Is there any restaurant you haven't tried yet?" Yamamoto suggests.

"Uh...well...I actually used to go out a lot when I was younger, but-" Tsuna looks around at his selection, eyeing each store for familiarity versus what he has an appetite for.

Then he stops seeing anything at all.

Yamamoto stops smiling. "Uh-oh."

"Is it happening? What do we do? Who is it?" Enma asks nervously.

Gokudera grabs Tsuna by the shoulders. "It has to be that tonfa bastard on patrol! Tenth! Snap out of it! Can you hear me?"

Tsuna cocks his head and looks around like an especially focused blind boy, clearly looking for something. Or someone.

"Yeah, uh, I don't think Hibari would really take well to- whoop, there he goes."

Tsuna is taking off through the crowds with a singular sightless intensity, pushing people aside and going full speed towards his target like a bullet train. He's aimed directly at the cafe on the corner – or, more specifically, the unassuming salaryman sitting at one of the tables.

He stops by leaping up and skidding onto the table of his sole focus of attention, staring with unmoving eyes, breathing heavily through his mouth. The salaryman looks up and smirks.

"Kufufu...Not bad, Sawada Tsunayoshi. Your range is truly impro-"

Tsuna completely ignores him and jumps onto the building.

With only short, abrupt emissions of Sky Flames keeping him upright, he sprints vertically up the wall, then leaps to a taller building, sprints up that one too, and with one Flame-assisted leap, fires himself across the wall onto the skyscraper across the road. His friends can only watch in horror as he crawls up like some kind of terrible spider, before disappearing entirely under a curtain of illusion.

Tsuna is too far gone to notice. He continues running up the building trailing small bursts of orange fire, even as illusions are thrown at him trying to distract, trying to confuse. Tsuna punches straight through them like sunbeams through mist. Eventually, the illusionist gives up entirely and starts throwing small poisonous animals at Tsuna, who effortlessly dodges and ejects himself to the next skyscraper over.

With three enormous skips and a somersault in the air, Tsuna lands heavily on the roof and raises his head to meet eye to kanji-printed eye.

"I knew this was a trap, but this is ridiculous," Mukuro says with a sigh. Then he narrows his eyes. "Are you...not in Hyper Dying Will Mode?"

Tsuna responds by flinging himself at Mukuro.

Mukuro deflects him with his trident, but then Tsuna leaps backwards, the back of his skull connecting painfully with Mukuro's chin. Mukuro pivots around him before Tsuna can knock the two of them down, but Tsuna skids on one leg and leaps forward again, perfectly in tune with the rules of gravity and his own body. He rushes forward with his bare hands outstretched, but Mukuro doesn't trust it, sliding Tsuna's exposed wrist in between the prongs of his weapon and twisting, so his arm is pulled back.

It should have incapacitated him, at least for a few seconds, but Tsuna just grabs the staff and yanks it to bring Mukuro closer and ease the angle of the trident to free himself. Mukuro frowns. He wasn't really going to crush the Vongola Decimo just yet, but at this rate, he may actually be forced to.

"I have to say I'm surprised. I didn't know you were capable of such strength without relying on the mafia and their tricks," Mukuro chuckles.

"Good..." Tsuna mumbles.

Mukuro raises his eyebrows with a smirk. "Were you truly holding out on me?"

Tsuna wobbles, and lifts his head. Mukuro realizes for the first time that Tsuna is drooling.

"You...smell good...sooo goooood," he whines, a smile of wild desperation stretching across his face.

It occurs to Mukuro that he may have just made a terrible mistake.

-x-

Reborn finds Mukuro on the roof, oddly panicked and sporting a half-asleep Tsuna suckling on his earlobe like a kitten.

"I hope this will serve as an adequate warning to you," Reborn says cheekily.

Mukuro grunts and tries to nod, but it just makes Tsuna bite down and mewl (mewl?) in complaint. Mukuro shivers. Reborn can't tell if it's from disgust, general sensitivity, or a more specific kind of sensitivity. Regardless, he hops over and pats Tsuna on the head.

"He'll be like this for two hours, and if you try to remove him, he will hunt you down. Have fun." Reborn smirks.

"What's stopping me from possessing him while he's vulnerable?" Mukuro asks, desperately trying to retain his false poise.

"Well, considering he's trying to tap into your Flames, the possibility that if you do, he will stay like this." Pause for effect. "Forever."

Mukuro fixes Reborn with a truly filthy look, and makes a show of woodenly patting Tsuna on the back. Reborn tips his hat in appreciation for his obedience, and makes his way off the roof with only Mukuro's muttered "what am I supposed to do with you now" to mark his departure.

-x-

Tsuna blinks awake, again, realizes he's lost time, and jerks violently into awareness, looking desperately around for what must be either his impending murder or sexual harassment lawsuit.

Instead he finds Mukuro, who is arguably both.

"HIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!"

"That's very nice to wake up to, thank you," Mukuro hisses.

"But how? You're not even a Guardian! I think! Are you? Do I have seven Guardians? Is that allowed?" Tsuna quickly crawls off the futon they're both lying on. As far as he can see, he wasn't plastered all over him like he was with Gokudera, so small mercies.

"You didn't even bring your weapons to the fight. I was insulted," Mukuro huffs dramatically.

Tsuna blinks. "What fight?"

Mukuro makes a face.

"Nothing. Go home."

"R-Right! I'm sorry! Goodbye!" Tsuna leaps to his feet and looks for an exit. It seems they're in...a movie theatre? He looks around in confusion, trying to connect his location with his memories, before he finally gets it. "Kokuyo Healthy Land has a movie theatre and a stage theatre? Why?"

"I believe the general assumption of the Kokuyo government was 'why not'," Mukuro drawls, propping himself up on his elbows.

"Still. That's so weird." He frowns at the gutted-out room, over half of the seats missing and a good quarter of the few remaining too damaged or filthy to sit on, and the spray-painted walls, and the dirty velvet curtains that are clean in comparison. He doesn't even remember this being here.

"They probably should have put it somewhere in the rest of the park, though. This has to be above the hospital, right? No one wants to go through a hospital for a day at the movies." Tsuna hops down and makes his way through the aisle, avoiding random pieces of detritus, and sticks his head out the door. "This place is a mess."

Silence.

Tsuna turns back to see Mukuro staring at him with an expression that does not look especially pleasant. He flinches back and stumbles through the door.

"I-I-I-I'm sorry! I'm leaving! Bye! Thanks for not killing me!"

"Trust me. I won't let it happen again." Mukuro grits.

Tsuna sprints down the red carpeting towards the stairs, and groans when he sees the slapdash job they did of repairing the staircases. It's been like, a year since they fought. They should have time to make these not be a deathtrap.

He slows down to carefully go down the staircase step by step, hand held against the wall for support, wincing at each dangerous creak under his feet. Every delicate placement of toes feels like his impending death. He's not sure he could tap into his Flames to save himself without pills or bullets to help him.

Tsuna lets out a sigh of relief when he makes it all the way down. How many levels were there left to go? About three? All he has to do is get through three more-

A child with a giant apple hat appears from absolutely nowhere. It takes a moment for Tsuna to register him as Fran.

"H-Hi," Tsuna gulps.

Fran narrows his eyes.

"You have to take responsibility after taking someone to bed, don't you?"

Tsuna pales. "That- that isn't, I wasn't, er-"

Fran passes him a ring. "You can use this to propose with."

Tsuna's mind goes blank. With a shaking hand, he takes the ring and pockets it. "Nice. Thanks."

"Good luck," Fran says, and then he just todders away.

Tsuna sucks in a deep breath through his nostrils, exhales heavily through his mouth, and sprints the rest of the way out of the building, deathtrap stairs be damned. When he makes it outside, he takes the ring, chucks it as far as he can physically manage, and flees screaming from the grounds.

-x-

Hibari blinks awake.

He feels something is...off. Likely Sawada Tsunayoshi's fault. He has been acting disruptive these past few days, much like he has been disruptive every single day of attendance at Namimori middle. He is one more incident away from being forcefully put in the hospital to avoid future cases.

It doesn't help that Hibari lacks the critical skill of perceiving the 'mood' of things, rending him incapable of actually knowing if these incidents are actually normal or a bizarre pattern of chaos coming from that particular little crowd. Before, he could just judge each incident in a vacuum of offense, but as things escalate to 'time travel to an apocalyptic future' and 'creating holes in spacetime to capture a ghost' and 'on somewhat friendly terms with the most disruptive student in the school', Hibari has been forced to admit that his frugal assessments are starting to become more of a hindrance than a shortcut. He may actually have to start asking Kusakabe how to 'read the mood'.

At some point. Eventually.

There's nothing amiss in the reception room, though. Just the steady light of the sun seeping in through the windows, utter silence, and the comforting sink of the sofa under his back. He had acquired a blanket, at some point, for the crisp air signalling the return of winter.

He huffs and throws the blanket off, exposing his torso and Sawada Tsunayoshi.

Every cell in his body freezes. Every cell in the little animal's body appears to be doing the same thing, out of fear more than shock. He's latched firmly around Hibari's legs, and Hibari can clearly see a spot of drool on his trouser leg, just under his left knee.

Slowly, Tsuna gets up, not breaking eye contact. Hibari follows him with his eyes, and he is conscious on some deeply buried part of his psyche that his mouth is hanging open.

Tsuna backs away towards the door, eyes still wide, hands slightly lifted, prepared for placating gestures. He eases back one step, then another, until he gets to the door. At a glacial pace, he opens the door without turning around, backs through it, and, still facing Hibari and staring at him with a look of pure, unrestrained terror, shuts it with a small click.

Birds chirp. The sun sinks further down into the distant hills, casting darker and darker shades over the room. The blanket slips a little to pool on the floor next to the sofa.

Hibari picks it up, pulls it over himself, and goes right back to sleep.

-x-

"IT'S OVER," Tsuna screams, sprinting into his house. "THAT'S IT. THAT'S ALL OF THEM. IT'S ALL DONE NOW."

"Are you injured? Do you need me to call an ambulance? Are you going to live?" Gokudera rushes out.

"I don't know, he might attack me tomorrow, but I think he might have been too sleepy to really register what was going on," Tsuna laughs nervously, and then laughs harder, and then crumbles into a full-blown hyperventilating panic. "That look."

"It'll be an educational experience. You've managed to convince your Cloud Guardian into helping you in a crisis, but you'll need him for other things as you take on more responsibilities. You need to take back the power in your relationship," says Reborn, sipping from his little teacup.

"SHUT UUUUP," Tsuna whines, ruffling his own hair furiously. He doesn't want to take back the power in their relationship. He doesn't want any power. Or a relationship. He is and always has been happy to be friendly-but-distant acquaintances with Hibari.

"Does this mean Tsuna-nii isn't sick anymore?" Fuuta asks, poking his head into the room.

"I guess. I don't think there's anything else. I mean, I might still want Sky flames, but the only ones I can think of who are Sky too are my dad – right? – and the Ninth, and they're already as close to family as it gets, so it's like...not as weird?" Tsuna shrugs helplessly.

"And Xanxus," Reborn says just to be mean.

Tsuna pales. "His flames are weird though. It wouldn't count."

"The density is impressive. He'd be an adequate base."

"It wouldn't cooouuunt!" Tsuna gives up all pretence of self-control and flees the room. Predictably, he ends up tripping over his feet and skidding bodily into the kitchen. He squints up to see his mom cooking with I-Pin perched on the counter.

"Hi, Tsu-kun! I heard you came down with a cold. Are you okay now? I could rush over to the store and get you some medicine if you need it!" She says cheerfully.

"I'm fine," Tsuna groans.

"Good, because your friend invited you over for dinner with his family! Isn't that nice of him?"

"Friend? Oh- you mean Enma?" Tsuna can't believe he has so many friends that it actually has to take him a minute to figure out which ones are being referenced. "That sounds nice, actually. I haven't really gotten to know his family at all, beyond the- uh- argument."

"Then this is great! Be home and in bed by eleven, okay? And he wrote directions down just in case you forgot or get lost."

"Thanks, mom!" Tsuna takes the paper sitting on the table, and grins at the messy, hard-to-understand scrawl taking up the first half scratched out with blue pen and replaced with small, sharply tidy writing that must belong to Adelheid, listing much simpler instructions.

"Okay, now I-pin, it's time to learn how to bake a cake!"

I-pin claps her hands and tightens the bow on her apron in preparation. Tsuna smiles, then silently thanks whatever deity there is that Bianchi is out doing the shopping right now. He darts back out, past Fuuta and Lambo, who are sharing a colouring book.

Regardless of the chaos, he thinks he likes his life as it is now, just a little bit.

-x-

Tsuna does not come home at eleven. He doesn't come home at all.

Reborn arrives at the Simon family residence not expecting much of anything at all – this could be nothing, a small issue, or a deadly threat ready to crush them harder than any danger before them. All equally likely, so it's meaningless to assume.

He doesn't bother knocking, just coming in through the window. He doesn't like what he sees.

The family is all unconscious, lying in various positions on the ground. From the environment, Reborn instantly picks up that whatever took them out happened right after dinner was done with, none of them are dead, and they weren't physically harmed on any unclothed parts of their bodies. He moves silently, fingers twitching over his gun. Still could be anything.

Then he can feel the bitter suction of the curse hitting him like it never has since it was first cast on him, pulling his Flames from his body with ease.

He flinches, looks down instinctively at his pacifier. Nothing. If anything, it only looks dimmer. He grits his teeth and marches forward through the house, looking for some outside source of draining. He's never heard of anything sucking up Dying Will Flames except for the pacifiers and Tsuna's revised Zero Point Breakthrough, so what could it-

Oh.

Hm.

Reborn lets himself relax in the doorway of Enma's bedroom and puts his gun away. He skims the room, and satisfied with what he sees, goes back into the main room of the house to move Enma's Guardians outside. Once he confirms they're safe, he decides to head back home and get another slice of Nana's expertly made cake.

He supposes that the Simon family is stronger now, and building a healthy relationship with them would only make the Vongola grow stronger in turn, especially after their attack painted targets on all of them. Besides, Tsuna has been through a lot of stress for a civilian his age, and might need a quiet reminder of what he's fighting to protect.

So for now, he'll leave Tsuna wrapped around Enma, with Enma wrapped around him in turn, smiling and emitting a warm, brilliant halo of Oath Flames, welcoming any energy close enough to be brought into their gravitational pull.

Hell can come later.

AN: The end! Probably not my best, this kind of concept usually requires a very goofy 1-2-punch style of writing and I am a meaty long!fic writer with very dry humour. OH WELL. POV is also really weird, I'm used to involved POVs that are nearly first-person save for name usage, but this is written far more generally. Experimentation! The most necessary part of every writer's lifestyle.

Anyway, how Tsuna responded to each Flame aspect:

Lightning – wrapping

Storm – biting

Rain – double-length naptime

Sun – hyperactive senses/literally just a wild animal

Mist – No presence

Cloud (+Earth) – Hyperactive absorbing