"No."

Reborn didn't blink. Anybody else would have. Sawada Tsunahime was on her way to being convinced that Reborn lacked eyelids entirely.

"Jyuudaime! Please, please give me a chance!" Gokudera Hayato begged as he prostrated himself on the ground. He'd been down there anyway, so it wasn't hard for him to shuffle into that position.

When the introductions were done, and Reborn had said that if she didn't want to die, then she had to fight... and as Gokudera had four sticks of lit dynamite in each hand suddenly, Tsunahime had been quick to perform the one act that no man or boy would ever think of to defend themselves. It didn't take long, once the boy was down and clutching his abused groin, for her to put out the slowly fizzling fuses.

"You need to grow your Famiglia," Reborn stated plainly. "Gokudera would be an asset."

"Be that as it may," Tsunahime said, "my Family already has a number of people in it. The position of 'Right Hand' is not available, nor has it been for years."

Reborn frowned. He'd arrived in Namimori only the day before. There was no way that his student could have gathered any appropriate members so quickly. Especially without him knowing. Wait. Years? And she had said 'a number', which was very vague...

"Then, I will be your Left Hand, Jyuudaime!"

"Also taken."

"Herbivores," a voice growled at them from the corner of the building.

Tsuna promptly bowed to the dangerous prefect that had appeared.

"Please excuse me, Hibari-sempai. It seems that my new tutor is insane, the new exchange student is a delinquent, and I have been caught in the middle," Tsuna explained. "Though I have done my best to prevent any harm befalling the school."

"..." Already narrow eyes narrowed still further.

Tsuna bent to collect up the snuffed sticks of dynamite, and handed them over to the prefect.

"He had these. Possibly, he has more. I only provided some extreme negative reinforcement in regards to how it would be a bad idea to make anything go 'boom' at the back of the science block," she explained softly.

"Very well," he permitted. "Return to your class, Small Animal."

Tsuna bowed again, turned on her heel without looking at either Reborn or Gokudera, and started to head back inside.

"As it seems the Small Animal has already punished you sufficiently, I will not bite you to death for bringing explosives onto school property. This time. However, you will hand over all of the explosives you have, or I will reinforce the Small Animal's lesson."

~oOo~

Tsuna returned home from school – she stayed late, always, to do her homework there with help from Hana and Kyoko – to find a boy in a cow-suit (tail and all) climbing up the tree that was outside her window. On its own, that would have annoyed her. As the boy looked to be about five, rather than fifteen, she wouldn't yell at him for peeping. She'd yell at him for trespassing, being stupid, and putting himself in a dangerous situation instead.

She was also going to confiscate all of those weapons he was carrying.

To start with, she yanked the halberd from his hold. It was enough to upset the child's tenuous balance, and he fell backwards. Tsuna managed to catch him, but all the weapons fell to the ground. It was lucky that they all had the safety on, or that could have gone very, very badly.

"That was a very foolish, dangerous thing for a child to do," Tsuna informed the boy. "You are also trespassing."

"I am the Great five-year-old Hitman Lambo of the Bovino Famiglia!" the child protested as he wriggled in her hold and fought (unsuccessfully) to return to the ground. "I came from Italy, I like grapes and hard candy, and I am the sworn rival of Reborn!"

"I see," Tsuna said, voice decidedly cool. "And how long have you been a hitman, Lambo-kun?"

"Um..." the child hesitated. "A month?" he guessed. "That's how long I've been learning Japanese."

"And you have learned it very well, Lambo-kun. I am most impressed. Are you particularly attached to the profession though?" Tsuna asked next.

"I will defeat Reborn!" the child swore.

"That doesn't answer my question," Tsuna countered firmly and plainly. "You could defeat Reborn-san in a pie-eating contest, or at a game of marbles, or you could be better than him at art. You don't have to be a hitman."

Lambo frowned in thought at that.

"My Famiglia said I wasn't to come back until I'd killed Reborn," the boy admitted quietly.

Tsuna nodded, even as she mentally sighed to herself.

"In exchange for handing over all of your weapons – all, Lambo-kun, you are not to keep back anything – and a solemn promise to abide by my rule and the rules of hospitality, then I, Sawada Tsunahime, the heir apparent to the Vongola Famiglia, will grant you sanctuary in my house and a place in my home," she offered solemnly.

Lambo started unloading weaponry from his hair. Some of which should really, really not have fit in there.

Tsunahime decided she was better off not asking. Either way, that was that. Her mother would be pleased to have more people to cook for. For that matter, so would Tsuna, though she would deny that if ever asked.

~oOo~

It was lunch time, and Tsunahime had every intention of deliberately ditching Gokudera and Yamamoto – the baseball star had heard Gokudera call her 'Jyuudaime' that morning before class, and asked if he could join in whatever game they were playing. He was an idiot, which was annoying, but he wasn't as abrasive as Gokudera.

"Jyuudaime!" Gokudera called after her.

"I am going to have lunch with my friends," Tsuna hissed at him. "You are not invited."

"Hahaha!" Yamamoto laughed. "Surely it's alright? The more the merrier, neh?"

"Not when I'm being asked to endure idiots," Tsuna snapped.

"J-Jyudaime! Don't lump me in with this – ACK!"

"I already told you this morning," Tsuna said as she tapped her hand with a ruler. A ruler she'd just smacked the silver-haired delinquent across the nose with. "Don't call me that here. While at school, you are to address me as 'Sawada-san', and nothing else. Until you can remember and follow such a simple instruction, you are an idiot, and I will not associate with you while at school unless ordered by the teachers."

"Hahaha! You sure are strict, Sawada-chan!" Yamamoto laughed.

"Goodbye," Tsuna said firmly, and walked out of the classroom with her bento. She was having lunch on the roof with Hana and Kyoko today. Unfortunately, her bento proved to have been tampered with when she opened it.

"Tsuna-chan," Hana said neutrally. "That... is not up to your usual standard."

"This is not what I packed for my lunch," Tsuna countered.

"It's better if you don't eat that," a voice piped up from on top of the door that led back into the school building. Reborn had appeared from... somewhere. "One bite, and you'll go straight to Heaven."

"I should shove some down your throat then," Tsuna quipped at the infant-sized bane of her existence. She seemed to have a great many banes these days, but only one (so far) that was that size. "Send you straight to Hell."

"Come out," the not-baby called over at the other doorway to the roof. "I know you're there, Bianchi."

The door opened to reveal a woman with pink-washed hair. Bianchi, presumably.

"Ciaossu, Bianchi," Reborn greeted her when the woman had crossed the roof so that she stood near where Tsuna and her friends were sitting.

"Reborn!" the woman exclaimed as her cheeks flushed. "I've come to take you back, Reborn. Let's do some large-scale jobs again? The place where you belong is in the dangerous and thrilling underworld," she entreated passionately, even as she fiddled with the ends of some of her hair like she was shy.

"I told you before, Bianchi," Reborn answered her. "I have the job of raising Tsuna."

Tsuna and Hana exchanged dry, unimpressed looks at that proclamation. For many reasons, not just the obvious.

"Poor Reborn!" Bianchi lamented, still blushing. "That means that if the tenth doesn't die in some horrible accident, Reborn will never be free!"

"Europeans are so dramatic," Tsuna grumbled, then threw the tampered bento into the woman's face. "Also, adults not on staff are not permitted on school grounds during school hours. Kindly piss off, before I do something more drastic than throw your own cooking back in your face."

~oOo~

They had home economics class after lunch. It was one of Tsuna's favourite classes. As much as she helped out her mother around the house, it was something that she really was very good at. It was also amusing – and occasionally flattering – to see the boys trying to race each other to claim whatever treats the girls were deigning to share.

Certain boys would always try to claim the sweets made by certain girls. Some of that was the skill at cooking, or the type of treat made, but a lot of it was also which girl they liked. Of course, there was also the issue of which boys the girls wanted to give their treats to.

Tsunahime, for her part, packed up her cake into a box, rather than putting it on a plate.

"Ara ara, not sharing with our classmates again, Tsuna-chan?" Hana asked knowingly. "Even Kyoko-chan lets our classmates taste her cooking sometimes, rather than saving it for her monkey of a brother all the time."

"To flirt is capital," Tsuna recited softly with a smile. "It is capital, and we must obey the law. Deuce take the law."

Act one of The Mikado, an English light opera. She had watched it (with subtitles, of course) with her mother one night, about a year ago, when it was on the international channel. It very neatly summed up her relationship status. Her friend was very familiar with the quote and its meaning by now. In the light opera, the act of flirting was punishable by decapitation. Hence: capital. It was still a wonderful thing to do (capital). To obey the law was to not flirt. Drat the law, she would find a way!

"Giving one of the sempai the cake that you made in class, however, is acceptable," Hana noted, still smiling that knowing smile. Then she frowned abruptly. "Why you choose to give it to him though -"

"You will never understand," Tsuna finished for her friend. "Even though I have explained it to you before."

Hana grumbled, and returned to the delicate matter of setting her cake just right onto the plate.

~oOo~

Tsuna blinked at the strange sight of a girl, about her age, walking along the top of the fences that lined the street. Any normal person – like herself – walked on the ground. Reborn walked on the railing of course, but it was wide enough for him that it wasn't an issue for balance, and it allowed him to be 'taller' than Tsunahime was.

When the strange girl stopped in front of Reborn – and he, in turn, stopped in front of her – Tsuna decided to just keep walking. Reborn wasn't a baby, for all he looked like it. She didn't need to babysit him.

The strange girl was standing in front of the Sawada house when Tsuna got back from school though, so it was suddenly an issue.

"How dare you corrupt the pure, angelic heart of a baby!" the girl accused. "I, Miura Haru, have come to rescue Reborn-chan from your evil clutches!"

"Dwarf," Tsuna corrected.

"Hahi?" Miura squeaked, her ire thrown off by Tsuna's bland response.

"Dwarf, not baby. Reborn-san is a grown man. He just didn't grow very much," Tsuna explained plainly. Really, it hadn't been hard to figure out. Reborn might look like a brat even younger than Lambo, but he didn't have the waddle-walk characteristic of children that age. That is to say: those used to having necessarily padded underwear wrapped around their bums, and who were still figuring out how co-ordination worked.

(As one who helped out with household chores, such as laundry, Tsunahime could even vouch that Reborn wore boxer-shorts the same colour as the band on his fedora. Satin ones, even.)

"Hahi? Reborn-chan isn't a baby? But- but- but- desu! He's so adorable and- !" the girl floundered.

"And older than both of us put together," Tsunahime stated.

"Then... he really is a hitman?" the Miura girl asked weakly.

"He said that?" Tsuna countered, then shook her head. Of course he did. "He's a live-in tutor. Or possibly an insane scam artist who believes his own cons. I haven't decided yet," she said with a shrug. "He has been helping me pick up my math grade, either way."

"Mou," the other girl pouted sadly.

"Please excuse me. I have chores to do."

~oOo~

"Reborn-san," Tsuna acknowledged when she was confronted by the sight of her 'tutor' on her way to have lunch with her friends. Gokudera and Yamamoto were following. Tsuna refused to eat with them, but that didn't stop them from eating nearby. "What's with the costume?"

"Bianchi made it for me when she was in elementary," Reborn answered, and rolled his spike-covered person into Tsuna's legs.

She felt the prickles through her socks.

"I see you've decided to be irritating today," she noted. "So Bianchi of the poisonous cooking skills made you a costume. That doesn't tell me why you're wearing it."

"Oh? A big surprise with a big chestnut?" Gokudera guessed from behind.

"This is a sea urchin," Reborn corrected with a smile, going along with the joke... to an extent.

"Hahaha! That's funny!" Yamamoto cheered. Of course he found it funny.

"Monkeys," Hana scoffed softly where she was standing next to Tsuna.

"It's camouflage for spying on people who commute on long distance trains," Reborn explained.

"More like making sure no one comes close when you have to ride one," Tsuna countered. "That is not camouflage. At all."

"It does make it easy to relax," Reborn allowed freely. "But as I said, Bianchi made it for me. With that in mind, it should not surprise you that whoever touches these spikes will go to Heaven in thirty seconds."

That said, he pulled out a stop-watch.

"San, nii, ichi..." he counted down.

Tsuna swayed dangerously, and her eyes rolled up. Hana and Kyoko just managed to catch her before she fell to the ground and hurt herself. Gokudera and Yamamoto hurried to help.

"Exactly thirty seconds," Reborn said with a pleased smile. "How precise."

"If you've really killed her," Hana growled threateningly.

"It's okay," Reborn assured her. "She'll wake up in ten minutes. Until then, I know a place where you can put her so that she can rest safely."

~oOo~

When Tsunahime woke up, she wasn't in the hallway any more. In fact, she was lying on a comfortable couch (comfortable but ugly, why were some of the most comfortable pieces of furniture such eyesores?) in an unfamiliar room.

"Is it over now?" a familiar voice asked, amused.

Tsuna sat up and looked around. Scattered on the floor were unconscious members of the Discipline Committee, as well as the limp forms of Gokudera and Yamamoto.

"It certainly seems to be, Hibari-sempai," Tsuna answered him.

"Small Animal," Hibari recognised. "What are you doing here?"

"I am not sure, Hibari-sempai," Tsuna admitted freely as she stood up from the couch. "The last thing I remember was my insane tutor saying that he had just poisoned me. I suppose the two idiots brought me here, rather than taking me to the nurse's office. Please excuse me, if the idiots inconvenienced you, Hibari-sempai."

Hibari gave a very small smile at that.

"This one," he said, and kicked Yamamoto's leg lightly, "has good reflexes, though he guards his right side. Baseball team?" he checked.

"Hai," Tsuna said as she nodded in confirmation, and moved to start checking over all of the unconscious people. "Did you hit either of the idiots – who have, unfortunately, attached themselves to me – in the head, Hibari-sempai?" Tsuna asked as she continued to check every head for any lumps.

"Iie," Hibari denied.

"Thank you. It's hard enough trying to get them to not be idiots, without them taking hits to the head," Tsuna complained.

"Perhaps head-trauma would improve them," Hibari suggested.

Tsuna bit down on a giggle. "Maybe it would, Hibari-sempai," she agreed with a bright, almost-innocent smile, then bent to drag the two idiots to the window. "But permanent damage to the students of Nimimori Middle would be bad, and head-trauma is very difficult to get just right."

"Ah," Hibari agreed unhappily, and stepped up to grab the nearest two unconscious bodies by their collars and begin dragging them down to the nurse's office.

Tsuna pulled one of the lighter looking ones over her shoulders. She didn't want to risk giving any boy a view up her skirt if he woke up en-route.

~oOo~

"Itadakimas," Tsuna said as she sat down with her breakfast.

A small hand reached over and grabbed the plate that her fried eggs were on.

"Oi!" Tsuna snapped. "Reborn! Those were my eggs!" He didn't deserve an honorific when he'd just committed food-theft.

"In the Mafia world, each man claims his own food. The early bird gets the worm," Reborn replied with a bland little smile. He proceeded to then steal her croissant as well.

"Oh, so Mafia men all have abysmal manners?" Tsuna snapped back angrily. "Mama, from now on, can we make Reborn cook his own food?" she requested, even as she stood up from the table again, disgusted with the self-proclaimed tutor.

"Ara, ara," Nana said, a little surprised by her daughter's fury. Normally her Tsu-chan was so calm and collected. "I don't think Reborn-san can reach the stove, Tsu-chan."

"I'm training you," Reborn insisted. "I'm showing you the hardships of reality."

"No, you're being an inconsiderate pig! Do you know the statistics for girls my age with eating disorders?" Tsuna demanded harshly as she cracked another egg into the still-hot pan. "And don't you talk to me about early birds when Mama and I have been up for an hour before you dragged your free-loading arse down here and stole my food!"

Tsuna had made her bento already, as well as dusted everything and sorted her laundry before she managed to snake her way into the bathroom to have her morning shower before Bianchi used all the hot water or Lambo made himself comfortable on the toilet with a comic. Her breakfast, and then brushing her teeth, were the last things before she had to go to school.