Ripples in the Sea of Time: Shark Tales by InsaneScriptist

Beta'd by the majestic Umei no Mai

Summary: Choices have consequences. Going to the past to destroy the future? Ambitious. Starting at twelve or so? Not impossible but unlikely. Good thing that Squalo's audacious enough for it.

Squalo woke up to the sound of his parents arguing. Which was funny since they'd been divorced since he was in his late teens and all the happier for it.

And that wasn't odd since he was back in his body as it was at twelve. Because damn if the cow-trash hadn't managed to follow through on his promises there. He was back! It was almost worth laughing about, if things hadn't gone to shit in the future.

Oh and there was his mother yelling. His father was too. Yeah, he remembered this argument. Or the general jist of it. This was one of the bad ones. And right before a math test too... That explained why he was at his desk studying.

Or was trying to. Math was not his greatest subject but not his weakest one either. It was just that past a certain level, math was rather useless to an assassin and daily living so he didn't care for it. It was for calculating percentages, measuring, figuring distance, determining how much fuel was needed to travel here, layover times and so on. Simple shit really, not the fancy shit that was needed to plot a graph of a cubic equation. Which he remembered nothing about, so he should probably study it. Enough to pass the test anyway.

He was more of a trig and geometry person, which was why he was glad that while the Varia did require seven languages to join, they didn't require calculus. That's right, he was going to get scouted for that soon-ish, so he'd have a few possible Varia watchers looking for potential; next few months soon-ish. The Varia didn't just invite a brat still in school to join them without stalking them first. They didn't look at middle school students as a rule because most weren't Quality, but Squalo had recently turned twelve and he remembered that he would be approached by a teacher soon about skipping his last year of middle school, so he'd be in high school.

It was part of why he went back to before he joined the Varia. More freedom of movement, relatively. Fewer eyes actually, because once Tyr was dead, he had been busy as fuck working on understanding the Varia, without much of a background in leadership. So while he may have looked like he knew what he was doing, he learned most of that from Xanxus after a few months of leading the Varia.

The Varia being curious little shits that they were, would follow him unless intimidated otherwise and being a teenager -no matter how skilled- cut into the intimidation factor unless you were a creepy little shithead like Bel. Or were just naturally intimidating like Boss but most teenagers weren't like that. Squalo wasn't.

There was a crash in the background, because he was vaguely sure that his mother was a little drunk and had reason to be since his father had missed their anniversary despite a previous agreement of trying to do better.

He wondered darkly if his father had already started cultivating his mistress at this point, since after Delf i n a... shit! If he could hear his parents his sister certainly could!

His sister's room wasn't that far away and no one would notice him leaving his room, so he did. She was tinier than he remembered, but that happened when he last saw her as a grown adult and she was still so little. They had quite the age gap between them so she hadn't even started school; her education with various toys and such yes, but not school because his sister was nearly a decade younger than he was. And already imitating his bad habits, while choosing a few more of her own. She was going to end up cranky, missing sleep.

Delfina was the youngest of Squalo's siblings and it was probably for the best that she had never met their older brother, with her being conceived after his death, and the conception was certainly an 'oops' on his parents' part; otherwise they would have likely parted ways earlier. Squalo would have liked to have said that he missed his older brother, had fond memories of him and so on but he didn't so Squalo never bothered mentioning him at all. To be honest he didn't mention family much at all, leading to a rather useful if persistent impression that his parents were dead.

Delfina however... she already had that ghastly coping mechanism in place or at least the start of it, and had already started with sign language if not exactly proper sign language since that was a bit hard to teach to a toddler. Squalo wasn't sure his parents had noticed yet that she was more interested in signing than speech since she was still at the child babble makes no sense stage, but they'd probably get to the point of taking her to the doctor sometime in the next year. Or was it the year after that? That bit of family drama at least made his parents play nice for a little longer. In public at least.

If she didn't hear the argument, then she could pretend it didn't happen. And while people using Flames young -even without knowing that it was Flames they were using- were pretty rare, they did happen. And there were often complications, generally because normal went out the window at the first sign of colored fire. Yeah, it was when she was four or so that she first used her Flames and that usage wasn't as obvious as a fiery aura; Mist Flames didn't quiet have the density for that without focusing them, but they could be used to block out sound. Not always, but that was later when she was older and knew how to control said Flames.

Squalo responded appropriately, a bit clumsy because he had to keep the flourishes and fancy fingerwork that the Varia used to turn a simple 'can't sleep, fine' into six other phrases, with varying context. No need to say, 'didn't sleep and happier for it' with all the implications that could be furthered with a bit of body language.

He patted his sister's head, went back to grab his work, returned to her room with his math book and a notebook and started humming 'La Marseillaise' complete with the verses not in France's national anthem, so the song lasted longer. Not really lullaby material but his sister seemed to like it.

It seemed apropos to hum while planning a route to see the Giglio Nero Donna, because really, that was going to take some doing and he'd rather have things settled within twenty-four hours and that seemed a bit more important than a math test that he was rather sure he had barely passed the first time around.

He'd just re-take it later, since he could probably justify running off for a day as adolescent rebellion considering his home life right now. Well if he wanted to draw attention to said homelife, which he didn't, so maybe he should make sure he'd pass it. Plus he had to set about preparing for the day ahead, like a change of clothing so he wasn't in a school uniform.

He had almost twenty years of experience of being Varia; this would be easy.

There were a few things that Squalo forgot to consider:

His body was twelve and wasn't used to four hours of sleep a night.

His mother decided to drop him off at school personally, which did happen occasionally but rarely and usually before she decided to run off to her relatives for a while. Well at least he'd not have to dodge her at home for a bit; his mother was sharp and that he was about half-sure his father wasn't actually as committed to their marriage as she was would be something she might pick up on. Especially the bit about his father's possible mistress.

His father was gone before Squalo even was dragged away from slumber by his alarm clock to get ready for school, so Squalo suspected that his father was likely going to only show up in the evenings for meals on occasion. Just him, Delfina and the housekeeper then.

Math was his first class of the day and he was rather sure he had bombed that test. Not massively so, but he had probably drooled on it before the teacher picked it up at the end of class since he fell asleep partway through it.

And nearly twenty years of being Varia meant that anyone trying to wake him up in a normal fashion ended up a lot of menace and killing intent thrown in their direction and he probably made some person piss themselves when they disturbed him, so they decided to let him sleep.

It obviously wasn't his day.

Squalo had woken up in time to not miss all of his last class before lunch and was a model enough student once he woke up. Like Japan, classes in Italy stayed put with the exception of certain classes that required specific equipment or structures, so he didn't have to tromp across campus to the music building or one of the science labs. Good news was that a classmate did tell him what he had missed in terms of class and homework.

Bad news was that his teacher had decided to take offense to Squalo sleeping in class at all but the problem with them doing that was that it was one of the foreign language teachers and Squalo had nearly two decades of Varia experience; fluency was no trouble, nor was accent or cultural knowledge.

Hell, he had even managed not to swear too much.

Needless to say that was a fiasco and Squalo decided that he was skipping the rest of the day. Usually school meant a few classes, then break and another class until one or so in the afternoon depending on the class, subject and school. He'd have to get whatever he had missed from a classmate, but honestly, Squalo didn't care about his grades too much. Never had, when his first passion was the sword and mastering it.

So Squalo rolled this one guy's motorcycle out of where it was parked and down the street a little way before he hotwired it. Squalo honestly didn't remember the guy's name, but did remember that this guy's parents financed at least ten or so vehicles before they stopped buying him new ones, so really he was saving the motorcycle from being destroyed somehow. Was he taking them apart or something? If he was crashing them he'd have spent more time off school and possibly killed himself before racking up that high a body count; then again, some people really were that lucky.

At least with a motorcycle he didn't have to try to reach the pedals, because that would be really fucking frustrating.

The most annoying part of the trade school that was the mafia academy was that it was all the way over in Calatafimi-Segesta; the town itself was under Vongola control, managed by one of the underbosses, but was surrounded on three other Vongola-aligned powers: the Lanza, the Alliata and his own Famiglia who pretty much ruled all the area north of Marsala all the way over to Castellammare del Golfo. Furthermore it was close to Cavallone interests in Castellammare del Golfo, the Rocca were pretty much next door in Alcamo, while the Zanasi and Scarlatti held a lot of the territory around Marsala, until they ran up against Alliata's territory.

In effect this meant that the mafia academy was in the center of the Vongola dominated western half of Sicily. And the Giglio Nero were a neighboring neutral family on the Vongola's eastern side. Pretty much a buffer, that the Vongola might be willing to help should they be attacked, for a price. Which was unlikely to happen since the eastern half of Sicily wasn't a breeding ground for the mafia. Historically, but migrations and the transferal of ideals happened historically too. So most of the famiglias that were there were small and fiercely independent; the rest were planted there by the Vongola mostly during the reign of Ottava's father to protect their interests, so those ones were mostly along the high way to Messina for the ferry for when people wanted to get to the mainland. Which was why the Vongola managed Termini Imerese and the Giglio Nero had all the area around the Parco delle Madonie and were officially based in Castelbuono, with all sorts of little hideaways in the mountains.

First off he'd have to get from Calatafimi to Alcamo, which was easy; he knew the land and how people watched it from here to there. Then from there, he'd have the choice to head up to Palermo and go along the sea until he had to head back into the mountains in Giglio Nero territory. Other options included going through the mountains in Varia territory -which were watched, if mostly by newbies- or zig-zagging through smaller highways and along the lines of the territory held directly by the Vongola really, he could end up in Prizzi if he didn't head towards the sea in the north. Admittedly he'd be going through Lanza territory in Corleone and passing pretty close by Camporeale but there'd still be a lot of backtracking because of the mountains and lack of roads.

The safest route for clandestine travel, so far as he could figure, was not along the sea road, no matter how quick and well-maintained the roads might be; plus there were tolls and he didn't have a helmet. Going to Palermo just wasn't worth the effort when he could turn off at Partinico, pass San Guiseppe Jato, go through Corleone and pass through the prissy Prizzi's territory. Then he'd start heading north east, going through Fontanamurata and hit mountain roads he'd have to try not to kill himself on until he reached the Giglio Nero's home base; just looking at those roads on a map had been bad enough. Most of the business done by them was in that area, so it was a good bet that Donna Aria would be around there somewhere.

After that, he'd be playing things by ear, because really the riskiest part of the whole scheme was dependent on her benevolence and playing on her maternal feelings for her eventual child, who was probably being used by Byakuran after her death.

If nothing else, he did write down a list of shit he needed to do and why, in case his future mind went back to the future. No need to just have one desperate may-work and half-crazy plan when you can have multiple ones.

The thing was, it was about two hours from the mafia academy to Prizzi. Then another hour and a half to where he could take his choice of crazy mountain roads, around the SS120. From there it was about another two hours to Castelbuono and who knew how long the business with the Giglio Nero would take, so Squalo was grateful there was no school tomorrow. His ass was dead from all that riding.

Thankfully the motorcycle had a full tank and he re-filled before he got to Prizzi and took a more circular way out of Corleone; it was not paranoia if you just made them think you took it out for a joy-ride should anyone seriously kick up a fuss, and Squalo was tall enough at twelve to pass for a woman, if a young one. He had to change out of his school uniform, because while the mafia academy was officially a trade school, it was still a private school and that meant a uniform of sorts; planning to skip the entire day meant he had a different set of clothes all prepared before his mother had otherwise ruined that plan but he had just tossed them in his school bag with his books before leaving for school. Squalo had forgotten how much he had hated those trousers, because they're hideous and would offend Lussuria to his very soul and dress code violations were probably the least infractions Squalo's going to pull off in school, since he's flagrantly breaking the law on numerous fronts right now. Not that anyone pulls him over or thinks anything suspicious about him driving.

Speeding may sound like a wonderful idea to shorten the trip but he'd rather not deal with the police. The good thing about borrowing his classmate's motorcycle is that due to omerta, it's not going to get reported as stolen. And really, there's a reason that most in the mafia academy are dropped off and picked up and it's because there's more than just one student who'd hotwire unsecured vehicles on a whim. It's something of a shame that hotwired vehicles tend to act up a lot once fixed, since it's a good bike even if he spent nearly six hours killing his ass on it.

Few proper mafia famiglias live inside any town or city; most have an estate on the outskirts so that they're close enough for all the attractions of urban living and none of the drawbacks, so Squalo kills his ass some more, meandering around the outskirts as he looks for Flame traces.

He's not Bel or Boss who can track a person for miles with the barest of traces, but he's certainly not blind to them and yeah, a couple of klicks outside of Castelbuono is the Giglio Nero stronghold.

And yes, he can feel the Arcobaleno Curse from here; Aria was a little older than Boss' age and hadn't started attending the Vongola parties and so on until she was nearly twenty from what he remembered of the gossip, so she's around eighteen or so. Mostly he remembers that she started showing up a few months after Boss was frozen, so there's that. He does know that the Giglio Nero do have a property in Palermo, as do most mafia famiglias of a certain affluence, for a certain value of 'in'; Palermo was always a few murders away from a complete upset in the balance of power and a bloody street war. As the ruling powers of Palermo knew this, they tried to keep everything reasonably civil, so it was practically neutral territory. In some spots.

He cut off the engine and looked at the simple manor; it's not built to impress, but Squalo could admire the defensive potential. There was a solid and functional wall surrounding the place, not a mere garden wall but something that could take a hit, being a few feet thick. The gate wasn't a fancy wrought metal one on exposed hinges; the sun would shine from behind the mountains before setting and thus put the area into an early dark and blinding any afternoon invaders. Dawn was a different story, but again, the mountains meant that it would only blind them for a bit in the morning; maybe around eight or so in the morning depending on the time of the year? Then again, it wasn't like the trees would take off the worst of that and they weren't close enough to be a hazard for any defensive purposes. There was a solid kill zone from the trees to the wall, and if the Giglio Nero didn't have their own well here, he'd be surprised; the trees alone said they had plenty of water.

A guard detached themselves from the wall, and told Squalo that he was expected. Yes, well, that's what being a seer meant. Knowing things in advance.

Squalo was let in the front door, although he had to surrender his sword, because even at twelve he never went anywhere without it if he could get away with it. The front door opened up to an entrance hall that was practically cozy. Still defensible, but the decor was less showing off wealth and more of a mish-mash between what was built into the place and what was decorating. No still lives or landscapes that he could see, but a lot of religious art.

He was led to the right and through three more rooms, where he saw he was in a study and possible office, along with Donna Aria. This was obviously a converted space, from what was originally a library, since the large room had access to an upper level through an internal and spiraling stair case. Plus lots of books.

"Squalo, I've been waiting a while to see you." She said confidently, thankfully leaving off his family name and waving away her men. They didn't protest that though, so that was interesting.

"Oh?" He'd not even been back for twenty-four hours yet.

"Yes, so it's best that we get this bit of business out of the way first. Your hand please?"

Squalo extended his right hand, and she held it as the pacifier around her neck flashed a soft orange light. He didn't feel much different. A little off, but there were all kinds of explanations for that. He still felt like him, the older him that he remembered, but a little different still. He wasn't sure what had happened. Ideas yes, but he wasn't a Mist. He felt a bit more settled, oddly or not so oddly enough. More like he belonged here, instead of being a mental interloper in his own but younger body.

"That certainly confirmation that it is a less than ideal future," she muttered, clearly angry about it. "I understand, maybe too much, but that is not a good way to go about things even if doing so may accidentally save the world."

"I'm failing to follow your reasoning for that." Squalo admitted, as his mind was currently wondering if it was just an integrated copy of his future mind in terms of thought patterns, knowledge and memories.

"I shall be blunt. The Arcobaleno were dead. We're Cursed yes, but being alive serves the purpose in keeping the world alive, or so my mother said and as I Saw before I accepted being Cursed. I didn't want it, but I dared not do otherwise. The Arcobaleno act as power-sources to balance the Flames of the World and without that balance, the world ends up Wrong and a series of natural disasters would kill over ninety percent of the world's population in less than a decade. In that sense, it's a small sacrifice, but one that's likely to kill me and certainly damn my daughter and my famiglia if this particular future comes to pass."

"And so you want help." Squalo surmised.

"Clearly. The Curse impedes my ability, letting the Curse run its course until the next time the Arcobaleno are chosen is a poor one, for all that it is a survivable one for my daughter without outside interference."

"But not the rest of the Arcobaleno?" Squalo asked, thinking of Mammon.

"Skies are rare and while her life wouldn't be much longer than mine, my grandchildren wouldn't have been Cursed; the Curse getting passed onto another Sky and a new set of Arcobaleno before the Curse was finished for a few decades. The rest of the Arcobaleno have been doomed since my mother said nothing to them prior to getting Cursed herself, as far as I can tell. I imagine there's a way to free them, but I just don't know how and I don't have the ability to remove the Curse or the pacifiers. I just don't know enough, but I'm not willing to be the cause of the end of the world by not wearing it."

"The rest of the Arcobaleno do need a Sky Arcobaleno. For the Harmony factor." Squalo said and pointedly didn't ask.

"Yes, and balancing their Flames with mine is not easy. The Vongola may be the most powerful mafia famiglia, but they're not led by the most powerful Sky. Doing it will kill me, but not for some years yet."

"Huh." He'd always known that Boss was the most powerful of the Vongola's selection of Skies, but the little Primo-copy wasn't far off either in terms of strength. Aria as she was, felt a significant bit more powerful than Enrico, the weakest of Nono's sons; closer to Federico's own level than Enrico. Federico wasn't amazingly strong, but certainly strong enough that no one really minded that Massimo had more Flames since Federico had the better qualifications to be Decimo. Like actual Guardians and a decent attitude.

And this was Aria who was reduced to what Flames the pacifier wasn't consuming. He believed that. He could. The Arcobaleno were monsters.

But something was nagging at him.

"You said confirmation, but you also said that your Sight is hampered. How did you know?"

"Because you're not the first with a bit of mental temporal displacement. I had a visitor, a little over a month after my mother's death."

It couldn't have been Boss. Boss had no desire to relive parts of his childhood and unlike Squalo, he found being watched by just the Varia instead of everyone to be a relief. Boss had planned to go back to the day he had learned he was adopted... had the cow messed up?

He doubted it, but then he realized who else it could have been. "Bel." Because there was no way that the little shithead wouldn't go back in time, just to kill his brother again.

Aria only nodded. "He visits sometimes."

As if that wasn't creepy at all, but that was Bel all over. Brat was six or so, and really how long ago had he gone back? Because how old had Aria been after her mother passed? Asking that would have been a rude question. "Not surprising," Squalo said instead.

"You're staying for a meal. I believe you missed lunch after all."

And see, this was the sort of shit seers did. Squalo already hated it.